Abstract:
To investigate impacts of environmental factors and soil physicochemical properties on woody plants diversity within Anji Zhuxiang National Forest Park, Zhejiang Province, and to ensure regional ecosystem stability and biodiversity conservation, the diversity indices, floristic characteristics and soil physicochemical properties of woody plants that grew in six representative small plots selected from this park were systematically analyzed. The results are as follows: (1) A total of 1 130 woody plant individuals were recorded in the six plots, belonging to 37 families, 49 genera and 70 species. The floristic elements of the woody plants were dominated by the temperate distribution type (54.29%), followed by the tropical distribution type (24.29%), the worldwide type (17.14%), and the type endemic to China (7.14%). Soil water-holding capacity, pH value, and total nitrogen content had significant effects on woody plant diversity (
P<0.05). In plot AJ-S05, which exhibited the highest field water-holding (528.5 g·kg
−1) and total nitrogen content (2.73 g·kg
−1), the species richness (37 species) and Shannon diversity index (2.646) were significantly higher than those in the other plots. In contrast, the acidic soil environment (pH=4.35) in plot AJ-S01 significantly inhibited the growth of certain plants, resulting in a marked reduction in both species richness and number of individuals in such a low-pH plot. It was further shown by the redundancy analysis (RDA) that nitrogen content and soil water-holding capacity exerted significant effects on shaping the community structure. Overall, the diversity of woody plants is affected by multiple external factors, among which soil water content and total nitrogen content are identified as important ones in the reserve. These findings provide an important reference for a deeper understanding of the dynamic changes of the ecosystem and for the formulation of corresponding conservation strategies of Anji Zhuxiang National Forest Park, Zhejiang Province.