Vegetation Dynamics of Anthropogenically Disturbed Ecosystem in Hilly Areas around Sargodha, Pakistan

Abstract

Present study has been conducted in order to evaluate the effects of different anthropogenic disturbances (stone crushing, grazing and cutting of trees for fuel) on the growth and development of different plant communities in disturbed ecosystem of Karana Hills near Sargodha. The data for density, frequency, cover and other derived parameters was collected using fixed quadrate method and analyzed by using canonical correspondence analysis technique. It was concluded that 80% disturbance was caused by stone crushing, 10% disturbance by grazing and 5% disturbance by harvesting and remaining by fire with other factors. Environmental factors significantly affect the growth as well as distributional pattern of the native plant species. Anthropogenic activities, especially stone crushing significantly affect community structure and composition, and distributional pattern as more stress tolerant species replace the sensitive ones.

Determination of heavy metals and Morpho-anatomical characteristics of monocots Aristida mutabilis and Cenchrus ciliaris in dust polluted stone crushing industry of Sargodha, Pakistan

“…Heavy metal concentrationi.e.Cd, Fe, Ni, Zn, Pbin root and shoot of selected plants varied in response to dust pollution. All heavy metals were lowest in concentration at dust free site followed by low dust site and moderate dust site, lower concentration of heavy metals may be due to the absence of stone crushers on these sites as revealed by [20,63] in their study that dust pollution from stone crushing industry carry heavy metals, or may be due to lower heavy metals concentration in soil because of no industrial e uents at these sites as in accordance with study of [60] on heavy metals.…”

“…All these parameters were highest in concentration at dust free site followed by low dust site and intermediate at moderate dust site. Higher values of physiological attributes may be because of no dust pollution caused by stone crushing industry due to the absence of stone crushers on these sites as revealed by [20,63] that dust pollution severely effect plant physiological attributes, lower heavy metals concentration in soil and air because of no industrial e uents so reduced effect of heavy metals on physiology of selected plants as described by [60].…”

“…Dust disturbs the ecological attributes of vegetation which include density, frequency and ultimately leading to unbalanced ecosystem [20]. Dust storms cause physical injury to the plants in non-forest areas which may lead to destruction of vegetation nally resulting in ecosystem disturbance [21].…”

The impact of Heavy dust pollution reduces biodiversity by altering the metabolism and biochemical characteristics of Fagonia indica

“…Cd, Fe, Ni, Zn, Pb in root and shoot of selected plants varied in response to dust pollution. All heavy metals were lowest in concentration at dust free site followed by low dust site and moderate dust site, lower concentration of heavy metals may be due to the absence of stone crushers on these sites as revealed by (Iqbal et al, 2016;Padhy, 2013) in their study that dust pollution from stone crushing industry carry heavy metals, or may be due to lower heavy metals concentration in soil because of no industrial e uents at these sites as in accordance with study of (Jaiswal et al, 2018) on heavy metals. Concentration of all above heavy metals in root and shoot of all selected plants were highest at extreme dust site followed by high dust site.…”

“…All these parameters were highest in concentration at dust free site followed by low dust site and intermediate at moderate dust site. Higher values of physiological attributes may be because of no dust pollution caused by stone crushing industry due to the absence of stone crushers on these sites as revealed by (Iqbal et al, 2016;Padhy, 2013) that dust pollution severely effect plant physiological attributes, lower heavy metals concentration in soil and air because of no industrial e uents so reduced effect of heavy metals on physiology of selected plants as described by (Jaiswal et al, 2018).…”