Dr. Juan Manuel Dupuy from the Department of Natural Resources, Center of Scientific Investigation of Yucatan (CICY) sent us the following summary of the current state of his ecological research project in the reserve’s forest. This project is providing us with important baseline information on medium forests in Yucatan.

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We have been doing ecological research since January 2005 on the regeneration and secondary succession of the seasonal semi-evergreen tropical forest of the Kiuic Biocultural Reserve. The work team includes two researchers, Dr. Juan Manuel Dupuy and Dr. Luz Maria Calvo; Filigonio May, technician; Alejandro L. Collantes, doctorate student; and Yasmin G. Martínez, master’s degree student. All are either staff or students of the Department of Natural Resources, Center of Scientific Investigation of Yucatan (CICY). Four students from the Conkal Technological Institute assist in the projects. They include José Edgar Chim, Josefina M. Uicab, Oscar Yam and Julio Yam. The crews also includes Sara Isabel Canché, intern, and Nancy Montejo and Aide Can, social service, all from the Conkal Institute. Funding comes from Mexican state and federal agencies, as well as CICY.

The overall objective is to determine and monitor the order, diversity and dynamics of the forest in its principle successive ages, namely: 7-10 years, 15-18 years and 50 years of neglect after being used for milpa growing corn). We are also investigating the ecological factors and processes that determine the regeneration of the forest in general and the dominant species in particular. The purpose in this is to help generate scientific methods of restoration, conservation and sustainable forest management.

We have three permanent study parcels of 1,000 square meters in each of the successional categories (9 plots). In August-September 2005 we marked out, identified and measured (length, height and diameter) all of the different sizes of woody plants (adults, juveniles, saplings and plantlets) in different units of each plot. We also determined the physical variables (hanging, microtopography), microenvironmental (dorsal opening, soil nutrition) and biotic (blanket of leaves). Based on interviews with campesinos, we recorded the history of each plot’s ground usage. Census of all sizes are being taken every six months, The saplings, plantlets and seed bank are checked every four months and a monthly register is made of ground cover and rain of seeds. We have finished monitoring the vegetation, the dominant arboreal species and the microenvironment of the nine permanent study plots. In May 2006, a meteorological station was installed, which daily records the reserve’s weather, including temperature, rainfall, relative humidity, solar radiation and evaporation.

The project was exhibited in the First National Conference of Forest and Agriculture Innovation held September 4-8 in Mérida. It was titled “Population of Arboreal Species in Chronosequence of the Seasonal Semi-evergreen Tropical Forest in the Kiuic Reserve. Project participants will also take part in the Tenth Congress of the Mesoamerican Society for Biology and Conservation to be held October 29-November 3, 2006 in Antigua, Guatemala and the Mexican Scientific Society of Ecology in Morelia, Michoacan, November 26-30 of this year

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