Taquara bamboo control as an alternative to recovery of the Araucaria Forest

Abstract

Native bamboos occur abundantly in forests with predominance of Araucaria angustifolia that were
highly disturbed by anthropogenic causes. The occupation of the competitive space by these plants may indicate that there is a dependency relationship between the establishment of tree seedlings and bamboos in the ecosystem. This study aimed at evaluating the establishment of seedlings of tree species that appeared naturally in an area strongly dominated by bamboos in the understory. An  experiment of mechanical control of bamboos
was established in the municipality of General Carneiro, southern Paraná State, with 1.00 hectare, following the
completely randomized design. The results showed that felling of bamboos may be effective to stimulate the
appearance of many species and also to increase seedling density. Mechanical bamboo control by felling,
combined with its biomass removal and understory thinning, is effective to stimulate seedling establishment of the majority of species in the forest. In general, it can be concluded that response of the forest to management practices is quite quick. Few months after the effect of bamboo control on the regeneration of the tree species might be clearly noticed. This suggests that management practices may be very effective to the restoration of degraded ecosystems.