The Human Impact on

Vegetation
 Learning Outcomes

• Discuss how human transformed the different

vegetation landscapes particularly the changes
that occur in the Philippine tropical forests.
• The large amount of world’s biomass has
reduced tremendously with terrestrial
biomass declined by 45% through harvesting,
deforestation, and conversion of grasslands
and wetlands for the last 2000 years. Human
activities which changed land use and land
cover have modified soils, have changed the
landform, changed the quality and quantity
of some natural waters, affected geomorphic
processes and influenced climates..
 The uses of Fire

• Humans are known to have used fire since

Paleolithic times. People use fire to:
– clear forest for agriculture, to improve grazing land
for domestic animals or to attract game;
– to help game as cover and hunting; to kill or drive
away predatory animals, ticks, mosquitoes and
other pests;
– to repel the attacks of enemies or burn them out of
their refuges;
– for cooking; to expedite travel;
• to burn the dead and raise ornamental scars on the
living;
• to provide light; to transmit messages via smoke
signaling;
• to break up stone for tool-making; to protect
settlements or encampments from great fires by
controlled burning;
• to satisfy the sheer love of fires as spectacles;
• to make pottery and smelt ores; to harden spears;
• to provide warmth; to make charcoal; and
• to assist in the collection of insects such as crickets
for eating.
• Fires occur naturally such as from lightning. Others
may occur by spontaneous combustion due to
ecosystems heavy vegetal accumulations which
were compacted, rotted and fermented thereby
generating heat.
• Falling boulders may also create a spark for natural
fires. However, direct anthropogenic activities
became the dominant driver of global fire activity
trends. Nonetheless, some actions preventing fires
has also resulted to what we call “fire deficit”.
• In USA, fire suppression activities had resulted
to the decline of the number of occurring fires
since 1800s. Fire suppression has deliberate
effect or consequences in the vegetation. It
naturally occurs because of its importance in
the ecosystem.
• Fire is also important to vegetation since it
played an important role in the formation of
various major types of vegetation e.g.
savanna, pine forests and in influencing the
operation of ecosystems.
• Fire may assist germination of dormant seeds
also.
 The effects of fire suppression are:

• Compositional and structural changes of the

vegetation
• Forest stands become denser and shadier
• Some seedlings of plants decrease in number
like the Sequoia seedlings
• Fire-intolerant species flourish
• The amount of combustible fuel in the ground
increases
• It can also alter seedbeds to benefit other
species of plants.
• It could also trigger the release of seeds and
stimulate the vegetative reproduction of many
woody and herbaceous species.
• Fire can control forest insects, parasites and
fungi as well– a process termed ‘sanitization’.
• It also stimulates the flowering and fruiting of
many shrubs and herbs, and to modify the
physicochemical environment of the plants.
Above all, fire could result to greater species
diversity.
The Role of Grazing
• Some grasslands of the world were natural grazing
areas of many animals. But the introduction of
pastoral economies affected the vegetation
structure of the world
• Light grazing though is beneficial to vegetation. It
permits succulent sprouts to shoot. It may result to
efficient spread of seeds as well. It may also
increase the amount of nitrogen in herbage area
because of the passage of grazed plants in the gut.
It could also increase species diversity by opening
another niches.
• However, overgrazing is detrimental to the
vegetation. Excessive trampling when conditions
are dry will reduce the size of soil aggregates.
• It may also accelerate soil deterioration and
water erosion. It can also kill plants or lead to a
marked reduction in their level of photosynthesis
while allowing poisonous plants and woody
plants to intrude. Above all, it could transform a
vegetation landscape into a grazing grassland.
 Invasive Species

• Invasive species are non-native species that

adversely affects habitats and biodiversity.
Common characteristics of invasive species
are: a) adapts easily, b) reproduces quickly,
and c) harms property, economy, or the native
plants and animals.
• Introduction of invasive species becomes a
problem because it threatens endemic species
of the area. It could also cause loss of farming
production while some invasive species could
affect health such as house mouse Mus
musculus, a carrier of a bacterium that causes
leptospirosis.
• The presence of invasive species may lead to:
habitat modification, resource competition
along with native species, predation of native
species and becomes a parasite to native
species.
• Some notable invasive species in the
Philippines are: the amphibians Kaloula
pulchra, Hoplobatrachus rugulosus, and
Rhinella marina; and plants Chromolaena
odorata or locally known as hagonoy, and
Imperata cylindrica or cogon.
Kaloula pulchra
Hoplobatrachus rugulosus
Rhinella marina
Chromolaena odorata
Imperata cylindrica
 Deforestation

• Deforestation is best defined as the temporary

or permanent clearance of forest for
agriculture or other purposes.
• Since pre-agricultural, world forests have
declined approximately into one-fifth, from 5
to 4 billion hectares
• The highest loss has occurred in temperate
forests (32–5%) followed by subtropical
woody savannas and deciduous forests (24–
5%)
• Forests are cleared to allow agriculture; to
provide fuel for domestic purposes, or to
provide charcoal or wood for construction; to
fuel locomotives, or to smoke fish; and to
smelt metals.
• The great phase of deforestation in central
and western Europe or as ‘the great heroic
period of reclamation’, occurred from AD 1050
onwards for about 200 years
• The European expansions had resulted to the
transformation of landscape in other countries
such as Australia, South Africa, New Zealand
and North America.
• Most equatorial lands have been deforested
since 3000 years ago BC specifically in Africa,
7000 BC in South America and Central
America, and 9000 BC in India and New
Guinea. However, some studies revealed that
pre-historic human activities were more
extensive in the tropical forest.
• The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)
estimates that the total annual deforestation in
1990 for 62 countries (representing some 78% of
the tropical forest area of the world) was 16.8
million hectares.
• In 1990 to 2000, the rate of deforestation in
Africa, Asia and the Pacific, Latin America and the
Caribbean was increasing while Europe, West
Asia and North America was significantly
reduced.
• However, Brazilian Amazonia was still
experiencing high deforestation rate. Some
areas were heavily exploited such as the
Philippines, peninsular Malaya, Thailand,
Australia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Sri
Lanka, Central America, Madagascar, West
Africa and eastern Amazonia.
• In 1992, Myers refers countries with
threatening rates of deforestation with
percentage of forest loss greater than the
global figure as -biodiversity hotspot. These
areas are particularly rich in species, rare
species, threatened species, or some
combination of these attributes.
• The analysis for hot spots uses plant
endemism and the degree of threat as criteria.
• These countries include: Tropical Andes,
Mediterranean Basin, Mesoamerica, Carribean
Islands, and the areas of southern Mexico,
Madagascar, northern and eastern Thailand,
Vietnam and the Philippines.
• Ironically, these forests are sources of potential
foods, drinks, medicines, contraceptives,
abortifacients, gums, resins, scents, colorants,
specific pesticides and other essential products
but the continuous and rapid loss is extremely
serious.
 The Philippine Forest

• Ironically, Philippines is also considered as a

megadiverse country. There are only 17 identified
megadiverse countries based on the assessment of
Conservation International
• These nations harbor the majority of Earth's species
and high numbers of endemic species. Nonetheless,
the biodiversity hot spot status of the country also
implies that ecosystem plunder has threatened the
rich biodiversity to extinction due to the
unprecedented rate of forest destruction.
• The continued forest loss is attributed to the
massive commercial logging, land conversion
and most recently, the various forms of
swidden (kaingin) cultivation.
• Historically, at the onset of Spanish
colonization, the Philippines was covered with
97% of tropical rainforests which was primarily
composed of four main forest vegetation types;
dipterocarp, mangrove, pine and mossy (or
cloud forests).
• Dipterocarp vegetation has the most
commercially important species, the
dipterocarp trees.
• In 1900s, more than 15 million hectares of
undisturbed and secondary forests translating
to around 70% total forest cover
• At the end of World War II, the remaining forest
cover decreased and 50% forest cover were left.
From 1900 to before 2000, a total of nearly 15
million hectares of forest were lost.
• Currently the country has remaining 6 million
hectares only. Primary forests have declined
dramatically to only less than a million
hectares today.
• Deforestation is a form
of replacing species-rich
forests with species-poor
ecosystems
• These also create
fragmentation which
more likely increased
disturbances from wind
and light penetration
which changes forest
structure, microclimate,
and standing biomass.
• Ecological succession of Philippine forests
began after the ban of massive logging.
Succession had been efficient and eventually
secondary forests dominated by dipterocarp
trees. But majority of the logged over areas
were modified and disturbed consistently by
farming from shifting cultivations and the
flourishing of plantations.
THANK YOU