PJB-2020-417
A Ramsar wetland’s endemic flora inventory and conservation of Chott El Hodna’s plants (Northeastern Algeria)
Abdelghani Zedam, Djamel Khoudour and Fateh Mimeche
Abstract
Chott El Hodna is classified as an internationally important site under the Ramsar Convention in Northeastern Algeria. It belongs to the Mediterranean arid bioclimatic zone. This area is an athalassic salt lake, with continental and dry climate. For the wetland operational management plan, it’s necessary to know the endemic flora, its spatial distribution, and its conservation status. We used a non-probability mixed sampling type according to the environment. We worked in thirteen stations and each station was surveyed several times. The stations were situated on two opposite sites. We conducted in all 353 surveys and recorded 37 plant families, distributed in 139 genera, and 199 species. The most important family was Asteraceae. There were 34 endemic taxa in the wetland flora which belonged to 17 families, distributed over 31 genera. Their most important life form was therophyte. Therefore the species richness was mainly represented by annuals. The endemic flora mainly belonged to the Mediterranean region, a world center of plant diversity. Eighteen species showing this restricted distribution belonged to Mediterranean element. However, no taxon is on the UICN Red List. Territorial zoning, based on endemism and species richness was established for the conservation of flora.
To Cite this article:
Zedam, A., D. Khoudour and F. Mimeche. 2022. A Ramsar wetland’s endemic flora inventory and conservation of Chott El Hodna’s plants (Northeastern Algeria). Pak. J. Bot., 54(3): DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.30848/PJB2022-3(13)
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