Relationship between Tropical Forest Distribution and Soils on Different Types of Mother Rocks in the Republic of Congo

Abstract

The factors influencing the distribution of forests and their development are important in order to better understand the bio-functioning of tropicals ecosystems forests. The Republic of the Congo has an important forest area of 23.5 million ha subdivided into three large massifs with different forest units from the north until the south of the country. The present study proposes to highlight the relationship between the edaphic and pedological factors and the distribution of the floristic species of some tropical forests of the Congo. To achieve this aim, a principal component analysis (PCA) was to identify similarities or oppositions between variables and to locate the most correlated variables. Also, the indices of biodiversities were used to assess the biodiversity between forest plot and forest sites. A total of 238 species distributed in 46 families were counted. We noted a CS similarity between Mbomo-Kelle and FMU Mokabi-Dzanga of 50%. However, there was considerable variability between the forests of the Impfondo-Dongou axis and of the forest of other localities. The main component analysis carried out showed that the distribution of floristic species in the studied forests is determined by the edaphic factors.