The vascular flora of the cerrado in Emas National Park (Golas, central Brazil)

摘要

The cerrado, a savanna-like ecosystem, is the second largest vegetation type in Brazil, originally covering about two million km~2 (or 23 percent) of the Brazilian territory. The Emas National Park (ENP), comprising about 133,000 ha, is one of the most important reserves within the cerrado. From November 1998 to October 1999, we carried out a floristic survey of all the cerrado physiognomies of the ENP and found 601 species, belonging to 303 genera and 80 families. Among the collected species, 12 were weeds and seven were new to science. The herbaceous to woody species ratio was 3.03:1. The richest families were Asteraceae (88 species), Fabaceae (87), Poaceae (51). Myrtaceae (39), and Lamiaceae (24); these five families comprised 48 percent of thetotal number of species. The results obtained show the importance of the ENP to cerrado conservation, since from 8 to 20 percent of the species recorded for this vegetation type occur within the reserve. We emphasize the need for more floristic surveysin which the frequently overlooked herbaceous component should also be sampled.