Native flora in Lebanon is threatened by tourist and urban development, urban expansion in the mountainous areas, political instability, over-collection of medicinal and aromatic plants, lack of legislation prohibiting over-collection from the wild, overgrazing and forest fires. Since the end of the civil war, people started to redevelop their home gardens and there has been an increased demand for landscape plants as a result of extensive reconstruction projects across the country. Lebanon's dry summer climate has created demand for landscape plants with low water requirement. Despite Lebanon's floristic richness, estimated at 3,761 vascular plant species, due to its location, topography and Mediterranean climate, most taxa used in landscape are non-native.; In summer 2002, face-to-face interviews were carried across the country with seventeen nursery managers. Production of woody plants from propagation to finished product does not commonly occur, although herbaceous taxa are grown locally. Most frequently, woody taxa are imported from Italian and Spanish nurseries. The nature of the Lebanese nurseries industry is to import plants, re-pot them, and re-sell the stock within a few months. There is no recent statistical database for nursery production or sales, as the government does not collect or require reporting of landscape imports or sales. Nursery managers are not aware of marketing methods for their products; the many challenges they face are plant production and marketing.; Fertilizer and water use studies were carried out on three species native to Lebanon that have ornamental attributes: Cercis siliquastrum, Acer syriacum and Malus trilobata. The fertilizer study aimed at determining the production potential of six sources of Cercis siliquastrum, two sources of Malus trilobata and one source of Acer syriacum, by exploring their growth, N, P, K nutrient uptake efficiency and partitioning under two fertilizer rates. Two-year old seedlings were planted in 11 liters containers in a 3:1 pine bark: compost substrate and half the seedlings within each source were assigned to either 25 or 100 mg N per L from 21-3.1 P- 5.9 K (21-7-7) Peters Water Soluble Fertilizer. Seedlings of all sources of Cercis siliquastrum grown under 25 had greater dry weight than those grown at 100 mg N per L. Those of Malus trilobata grown under the low fertilizer rate were taller than those grown at the high fertilizer rate. Growth of Acer syriacum was not affected by fertilizer rates. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)
展开▼
