DOI: 10.15468/h67txm
title: Quantitative and Semi-quantitative survey of the vegetation of Seychelles through stand scale plots

description: This dataset compiles the main data available on the vegetation of Seychelles sampled through vegetation plots at the stand scale (see Senterre et al. 2021). More data exists than what is currently available, and those will eventually be added later. At this stage, the dataset contains the survey of 73 sites, on the islands of Mahé and Silhouette, in mesic, ravine, or swampy forest stands, some pristine and others semi-natural at a late secondary stage. The individual surveys compiled are:
• BS01 to BS12 (Senterre et al., 2009)
• BS-LC-1 to -7 (Senterre and Chong-Seng, 2016)
• HE-01 to -12 (El Zein, 2011)
• MZMM-01 to -26 (Cesar and Zehnder, 2020)
• SIP-01 to -15 (Baguette et al., 2022)
All sampling events follow the same methodology, described in Senterre et al. (2008) and Baguette et al. (2022). Vegetation plots (sampling events) are placed in carefully selected sites, based on their general homogeneity (i.e. avoiding within plot environmental discontinuities or gradients, such as local degradation, mixing of stream and well drained etc.). The selected stands are described using an Android survey designed with Open Foris Collect (Senterre et al., 2021). The installation file for the survey is available here: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/353345419_BIO_KBA_3_4_Open_Foris_Collect_Survey_File_with_species_list_for_Seychelles.
Once described, each stand is sampled using a nested plot approach, combining three different plots (sampling events) within the stand: one for the trees, one for the shrub layer, and one for the herbaceous understorey plus recruitment.
For 7 sites near Mare aux Cochons on Mahé (out of the total of 73 sites, on Mahé and Silhouette), the tree layer is sampled in more details, using two subsets of trees. This method is described in Senterre and Chong-Seng (2016).
Baguette, F., Harryba, S., Baboorun, T., Adam, P.-A., Senterre, B., 2022. Characterization and evolution of the lowland tropical rain forest of the smallest oceanic Gondwana fragments, with implications for restoration and invasion ecology. For. Ecol. Manag. 504, 119837. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foreco.2021.119837
Cesar, S., Zehnder, M., 2020. Relating the Rehabilitation of Water Catchment Forest in the Morne Seychellois National Park with the Perspectives and Expectations of Local Communities in a Small Island Nation (Master Thesis). Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH), Zurich, Switzerland.
El Zein, H., 2011. Caractérisation des types de forêts montagnardes sur l’île de Mahé (Seychelles) (Master Thesis). Université Libre de Bruxelles, Bruxelles.
Senterre, B., Chong-Seng, L., 2016. Biodiversity assessment and rehabilitation potential of forests in the Mare aux Cochons catchment (Mahé, Seychelles). (Consultancy Report), Ecosystem-based adaptation to climate change in Seychelles (EBA project). Government of Seychelles, United Nations Development Programme, Victoria, Seychelles.
Senterre, B., Gerlach, J., Mougal, J., Matatiken, D.E., 2009. Old growth mature forest types and their floristic composition along the altitudinal gradient on Silhouette Island (Seychelles) - the telescoping effect on a continental mid-oceanic island. Phytocoenologia 39, 157–174. https://doi.org/10.1127/0340-269X/2009/0039-0157
Senterre, B., Lowry II, P.P., Bidault, E., Stévart, T., 2021. Ecosystemology: a new approach toward a taxonomy of ecosystems. Ecol. Complex. 47, 100945. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecocom.2021.100945