Vegetation Survey and Classification of Subtropical Forests of Southern Africa

Vegetation Survey and Classification of Subtropical Forests of Southern Africa

Author: Ladislav Mucina

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2017-12-19

Total Pages: 251

ISBN-13: 3319678310

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This book highlights classification patterns and underlying ecological drivers structuring the vegetation of selected indigenous subtropical forests in South Africa. It uses original field sampling and advanced numerical data analysis to examine three major types of forest – Albany Coastal Forests, Pondoland Coastal Scarp and Eastern Scarp – all of which are of high conservation value. Offering a unique and systematic assessment of South African ecology in unprecedented detail, the book could serve as a model for future vegetation surveys of forests not only in Africa, but also around the globe.


A Century of Geography at Stellenbosch University 1920-2020

A Century of Geography at Stellenbosch University 1920-2020

Author: Gustav Visser

Publisher: African Sun Media

Published: 2020-09-28

Total Pages: 212

ISBN-13: 1928480748

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A Century of Geography at Stellenbosch University 1920-2020 focuses on the establishment and development of geography as an academic discipline at Stellenbosch, South Africa’s founding geography department. The ways in which the department currently operates are deemed fundamentally joined to its past and pave the way for the evolution of geography and its various subdisciplines going forward. The investigation seeks to highlight the development of the discipline and its institutionalisation as part of the academic offerings of the university, while providing details about the teaching and research conducted, as well as of the people who contributed to these endeavours. It also furnishes the academic geography community at Stellenbosch, and geography more broadly, with some insights into its past development and more recent changes, along with a complete bibliography of conducted research.


Underexplored Medicinal Plants from Sub-Saharan Africa

Underexplored Medicinal Plants from Sub-Saharan Africa

Author: Namrita Lall

Publisher: Academic Press

Published: 2019-11-07

Total Pages: 360

ISBN-13: 0128168218

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Underexplored Medicinal Plants from Sub-Saharan Africa: Plants with Therapeutic Potential for Human Health examines a comprehensive selection of rarely explored plants that have been underestimated for their therapeutic value. The book contains monographs of medicinal plants, outlining their botanical description, geographical distribution, ethnobotanical usage, chemical constituents, sample and standard preparations and methods, and pharmacological properties. With expert contributors from South Africa, Mauritius, Seychelles, Cameroon and Nigeria, and the compilation of ethnobotanical, taxonomic and pharmacologic information for each species, this book is a valuable resource for researchers, academics in pharmacology, ethnopharmacology, medicinal plant sciences, and more. - Explores the therapeutic potential of a comprehensive selection of underexplored and underutilized medicinal plants in sub-Sahara Africa - Provides a summary table of structures of any known natural products, including details of plant source (chapter) and observed activity (e.g. anticancer, antibacterial) - Includes contributions from experts from South African, Mauritius, Seychelles, Cameroon and Nigeria


A Scientific Bibliography of the Far Northern Drakensberg

A Scientific Bibliography of the Far Northern Drakensberg

Author: Rodney Moffett

Publisher: UJ Press

Published: 2023-04-14

Total Pages: 334

ISBN-13: 1776434137

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This Scientific Bibliography of the “Far Northern Drakensberg” is a continuation by the Afromontane Research Unit of the University of the Free State (ARU) to document published and other similar works on the mountains of the summer rainfall area of South Africa. It follows “A Scientific Bibliography of the Drakensberg, Maloti and Adjacent Lowlands” which was published in 2020 (Moffett 2020), and which covered the area between the North-Eastern Cape and the North-Eastern Free State. The current work extends this northward by including articles and publications dating back to 1875 (E.Cohen, on the Lydenburg goldfields) reaching as far as the Wolkberg and Woodbush near Tzaneen in Limpopo Province. Figure 1 shows the boundary of the area covered, and although referred to as the Far Northern Drakensberg in this work, it is identical to that described as the LMEE, Limpopo, Mpumalanga & Eswatini Escarpment by Clarke et al (2022). Although slightly separate from the “lower” escarpment, the mountainous Barberton and adjacent Eswatini area, as well as the Leolo Mountains in eastern Sekhukhuneland are also included. Details on how the boundary in figure 1 was determined are given in Clark et al (2022). Bibliographies on two further ranges in the summer rainfall area, viz. the Magaliesberg in Gauteng province and the Soutpansberg in Limpopo province are to be the subject of future compilations.


Vegetation of Southern Africa

Vegetation of Southern Africa

Author: R. M. Cowling

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1997

Total Pages: 656

ISBN-13: 9780521548014

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Comprehensive illustrated guide to plant science and ecology of southern African vegetation.


The Biodiversity of African Plants

The Biodiversity of African Plants

Author: Xander van der Maesen

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2012-12-06

Total Pages: 864

ISBN-13: 9400902859

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Proceedings of the XIVth AETFAT Congress, 22-27 August 1994, Wageningen, the Netherlands


Fynbos

Fynbos

Author: Nicky Allsopp

Publisher: OUP Oxford

Published: 2014-09-18

Total Pages: 413

ISBN-13: 0191669105

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South Africa's fynbos region has intrigued biologists for centuries. It has achieved iconic status as a locus of megadiversity and therefore a place to study the ecological underpinnings of massive evolutionary radiations. Researchers have made great advances over the past two decades in unravelling the complexities of fynbos ecology and evolution, and the region has contributed significant insights into the adaptive radiations of large lineages, conservation science, pollination biology, invasive plant biology, and palaeoanthropology. Lessons from the fynbos offer much of value for understanding the origin, maintenance, and conservation of diversity anywhere in the world. This book provides the first synthesis of the field for 20 years, bringing together the latest ecological and evolutionary research on the South African global biodiversity hotspots of the Greater Cape Floristic Region - the iconic fynbos and succulent karoo. It explores the historical and modern physical and biological environment of this region, the circumstances and processes which have fostered its remarkable biodiversity, and the role this diversity has played in the emergence of modern humans. It also discusses the challenges of contemporary management and conservation of the region's biodiversity in the face of accelerating global change.


Biogeography and Ecology of Southern Africa

Biogeography and Ecology of Southern Africa

Author: Marinus J.A. Werger

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2012-12-06

Total Pages: 1402

ISBN-13: 9400999518

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Southern Africa is certainly not a naturally bounded area so that there are several possibilities for delineating it and concepts about its extent. Wellington* discussed the various possibilities for delineation and suggested that one line stands out more clearly and definitely as a physical boundary than any other, namely the South Equatorial Divide, the watershed between the ZaIre, Cuanza and Rufiji Rivers on the one hand and the Z ambezi, Cunene and Rovuma Rivers on the other. This South Equatorial Divide is indeed a major line of separation for some organisms and is also applicable in a certain geographical sense, though it does not possess the slightest significance for many other groups of organisms, ecosystems or geographical and physical features of Africa. The placing of the northern boundary of southern Africa differs in fact strongly per scientific dis cipline and is also influenced by practical considerations regarding the possibilities of scientific work as subordinate to certain political realities and historically grown traditions. This is illustrated, for example, in such works as the Flora of Southern Africa, where the northern boundary of the area is conceived as the northern and eastern political boundaries of South West Africa, South Africa and Swaziland. Botswana, traditionally included in the area covered by the Flora Zambesiaca, thus forms a large wedge in 'Southern Africa'.