| dc.description.abstract | Due to increasing populations this has accelerated the increase of forestry related activities for
the last 30-40years leading destruction of the forest ecosystem services including loss of carbon
sequestration sinks, loss of plant species diversity. Timber harvesting in Budongo forest directly
affected the forest ecosystem through removing mature individual timber trees, causing
incidental damage to seedlings and saplings during the logging operation. The study was to
cover up the gap of lacking knowledge about the effects of seedling recruitment on the tree
diversity and tree structure and composition in unlogged and logged forest area (research area
N3) and its contribution in scientific research concerning forest ecology. The study aimed to
compare the survival and status in the logged and unlogged area in Budongo Forest Reserve
focusing on N3 and N15. The study was grounded on three objectives: (I) To assess seedling
recruitment in the logged area of N3 and the unlogged areas of N15, (II) To document tree
diversity within logged and unlogged forest area, (III)To determine species dominance for
different growth stages in the logged and unlogged area.
The study was conducted in 40 nested Plots of 30mX20m where the first plot was established
randomly 10m from the edge of the compartment avoiding the edge effect with 30metres left
between the adjacent plots to allow heterogeneity The results indicated that N3 was more
diverse with a sum of 710 and 445 observed individuals for the logged and unlogged areas
respectively in seedling stage, is a significant relationship between RCD and Height of the
species since P-value (0.000) is less than the α-value (0.05) for N3, while in N15, there is a
significant relationship between RCD and Height of the species since P-value (0.000) for N15.
The study revealed results that there was slight difference in Shannon diversity H1
, N3 being
more diverse both in saplings and adults with 2.4572 and 2.1012 (saplings), 2.8005 and
2.5838 (adults). Furthermore, results revealed that there is no consistency of species
dominancy among the different growth stages that is species dominant in seedling stage differ
from those in sapling stage and adult stages due to a combination of various factors that are
both environmental and physical. Furthermore, the three species Rinorea ilicifolia N15,
Lasiodiscus mildbraedii N3 for seedlings, Celtis mildbraedii N5, Lasiodiscus mildbraedii N3
for saplings and Lasiodiscus mildbraedii N15, Funtumia elastica N3 were widely distributed
throughout the forest, although at varying abundances. However, Logging has put pressure on
preferred species. Khaya anthotheca, was one of the species that dominated the forest in the
past and today, it is found mostly in the nature reserve the majority being in the sapling stage
and therefore silivicultural practices such as enrichment planting, close supervision and patrol
should be emphasized to reduce the illegal utilization (harvesting) of forest resource | en_US |
