Atributos químicos do solo e composição química de folhas de mangue vermelho (Rhizophora mangle L.) em um manguezal e área transicional em São João de Pirabas, Pará

Abstract

Mangroves are characteristic coastal ecosystems of tropical and subtropical regions of great social and ecological importance. At Amazon these ecosystems represent more than half of mangrove areas of Brazil (about 70%) and are renowned for their great exuberance and magnitude related to regular distribution of rainfall, high temperatures, the large tidal range (> 4m) and the supply of sediments from the rivers of this region. Changes in water characteristics and physic-chemical soil properties can cause changes in nutrient dynamics in these ecosystems. In transitional environments these characteristics are altered and may have effects on the concentration of nutrients in the ecosystem compartments. In order to differentiate these transitional environments and the actual mangrove environments for the concentration of nutrients, this study aims to determine the nutrient content in the soil, in Rhizophora mangle L. leaves and leaf litter in these two types of environments in two seasonal periods, in a mangrove of the Amazon coast. Samples were collected in the drier month (September 2011) and in the rainy month (April 2012) in the two areas and subjected to chemical analysis for the concentration of macro (Ca, Mg, Na, K, Al, S, P, N, C) and micro nutrients (Cu, Zn, Mn, Fe). We also analyzed the physico-chemical properties of the soil (Eh, pH and salinity) and the granulometry of the ground. The results show higher nutrient concentrations in the fringe mangrove soil when compared to the transition zone (mangrove x secondary forest), indicating that the Eh, which is lower in the first influenced by the proximity to the sea and the highest frequency of flooding by tides, is the main differentiating factor in the concentration of soil nutrients. The nutrients in the Rhizophora mangle L. leaves not differ significantly from one environment to another and do not follow the same pattern of soil concentration on the two areas studied, however, the leaves nutrients are more influenced by the difference of a climatic period for other. Thus, the red mangrove trees of the transition zone can maintain a concentration of nutrients similar to the fringe of the forest, and the structural difference of the woods is more related to soil particle size than the nutritional relationship, since these trees have physiological mechanisms for the maintenance and selection of nutrients, such as N which could be a limiting nutrient in these environments.