Vegetation Analysis of Ngel Nyaki Forest Reserve, Mambilla Plateau, Nigeria

The vegetation of Ngel Nyaki Forest Reserve, Nigeria was analysed using data gathered with point-centred quarter method. 80 trees belonging to 29 species distributed in 21 families were encountered. The density of trees was 785 trees per hectare. The girth-size distribution curve indicated that the vegetation of Ngel Nyaki is stable and self-sustaining. The more dominant species based on Importance Values are Poulteria altissima, Polyscias fulva, Carapa grandiflora and Entandrophragma angolense. The least dominant species are Dombeya ledermanii, Celtis occidentalis and Croton macrostachyus. Keywords: Ngel Nyaki Forest Reserve, Mambilla Plateau, vegetation analysi

Community - Based Forest Management In Buru, Taraba State, Nigeria

The Nigerian Conservation Foundation (NCF) in partnership with Royal Society for Protection of Birds (RSPB) mounted a 5-year (2005-2010) Participatory Forest Management Project in Buru community, a remote rural village in Kurmi Local Government of Taraba State, Nigeria. The project was implemented through a series of environmental awareness campaigns, training workshops, lectures, seminars, stakeholder meetings and adult literacy programmes woven around three themes: Forest Governance, Improved livelihoods, Forest Patrol and Monitoring. The project established a working governance structure that ensured of all stakeholders including women to achieve the objectives of the project. Since inception, no commercial logging has occurred in Buru community forest while poaching has dramatically reduced. In some cases the patrol group had intercepted lorries carrying logs from surrounding forests and handed culprits over to the police for prosecution. The patrol group had been collecting data from forests about plant phenology and sighted animals. In one case they saw a dead bird that migrated from Finland to the forest. All participants recorded recorded improved livelihoods through increased household income from harvesting processing and selling forest products. Gender issues were taken care of as over 40% of the participants were women. This forest management model is recommended to Governments to  adopt it as a state forestry policy and staff should be trained to monitor the programmes and ensure compliance with the agreed management plans. Keywords: Nigeria, Buru, Community-based forest management, Conservation, Nigeri

On r- And K- Selection Theory: Life History Strategy of Emilia Coccinea (Sims) G. Don and Emilia Sonchifolia (Linn.) Dc

Roots , stems, leaves and flowers of Emilia coccinea (Sims)G. Don and Emilia sonchifolia were harvested, separated and oven-dried at 1100 C for 48 hours  and then weighed to determine what proportion of their total biomass was allocated to each of the tissues. E. coccinea allocated 42.65% and E. sonchifolia allocated 36% of their total biomasses to stems respectively.  These represent the greatest allocation of their total biomasses allocation. However, E. sonchifolia allocated a relatively greater proportion of its biomass to reproductive structures than E. coccinea. E. coccinea allocated 93.4% of its biomass to vegetative tissues while E. sonchifolia allocated 70.1% to vegetative tissues. The two species allocated about the same percentage of biomass to roots. On the basis of their allocations to vegetative and reproductive tissues E. coccinea can be said to be K- selected with respect to E. sonchifolia which is r- selected. The result of this study supports the r- and K- selection theory. Keywords: life-history strategy, Emilia coccinea, Emilia sonchifolia. r-and K. selectio

Vegetation Development Dynamics of Fire Experimental Plots at Olokemeji Forest Reserve, Nigeria.

An enumeration of trees in the three fire investigation plots of Forestry Research Institute of Nigeria (FRIN) at Olokemeji Forest Reserve, Nigeria was carried out. Since the inception of the investigation Plot A was burned annually at the end of dry season, when the plants were very dry,  Plot B was burned early in the dry season when plants were still wet and Plot C was not subjected to burning, hence the control Plot.  All the trees in each plot were counted and their girths were measured. The data was used to calculate and compare the Shannon-Weiner diversity index for plots and the Importance Values (IV) as a measure of dominance of the species. The late burn plot (Plot A) had changed to savanna woodland formation with a diversity index of 2.76 and the dominant trees were Dalbergia sisso, Gmelina arborea and Crossopteryx febrifuga. Plot B had changed to transitional woodland with a diversity index of 2.83 while the dominant trees were Gmelina arborea, Anogeissus lieocarpus and Malacantha alnifolia. A few fire tender species such as Manilkara obovata and Mimusops andongensis were present. Plot C had developed into a full fledge forest formation with a diversity  index of 3.8 while the dominant trees were Manilkara obovata, Hildegardia barteri and Gmelina arborea. Only plot C had soil litter with a biomass of 153.4g.m2. Girth size/class curve for plot A showed a characteristic curve for populations under stress while those for Plots B and C showed curves characteristic of stable populations but curve C showed a better ecological status. Keywords: .fire, Olokemeji Forest Reserve, vegetation development, Nigeri

Training of manpower in the marine fishing industry of Nigeria

Although specialised agencies of ‘\u27the United Nations Organisation have assisted in the development of the Nigerian fishing industry, this assistance has been directed mainly to the organisation and management of traditional fishermen of the riverine villages whilst the less labour intensive and more productive industrial fishing at sea has been left to the exploitation of foreigners. More than 160 trawlers, some being more than 3,500 CRT, currently operate under licence in the exclusive economic zone of Nigeria and not one of them is manned entirely by Nigerians. The subject of manpower development in the sea-fishing industry of Nigeria is therefore one that is in need of urgent attention and so the purposes of this project are to direct attention to it, to the main problems associated with it and to offer some constructive suggestions concerning it. In the achievement of these ends, the author examines the international provisions for training, the relevant laws and regulations of Nigeria, the School of Fisheries already established in Nigeria and the general maritime training in the country. Using his experience of the training systems of some other countries, he then highlights the lessons to be learned and proposes possible solutions to the main problems identified

Elephant’s activities elicited biodiversity disturbance in Omo Biosphere Reserve, Nigeria

Disturbance by herbivores occurs in most of the natural ecosystems and influence species diversity and vegetation structure. This study compares the vegetation of elephant (disturbed) zone (EZ) and non-elephant (undisturbed) zone (NEZ) in the Omo biosphere reserve to assess the effect of elephant browsing on the vegetation. Woody species densities, basal area, importance value and species diversity were determined from twenty sampling plots (20 m x 20 m) established randomly each in the EZ and NEZ. The result of floristic composition shows more species were in the NEZ than EZ. The species diversity reduced by 3.3% in EZ. Sorensen index of similarity of the two communities was 62%. Celtis zenkeri (74.75) and Diospyros dendo (51.1) dominated the species in the EZ while Gmelina arborea (127.35) and Funtumia africana (16.63) were the dominant species in the NEZ. Browsing of elephants directly influence species composition, diversity and structure in the forest ecosystem leading to loss of biodiversity

Unavailability of K-out-of-N: G Systems with non-identical Components Based on Markov Model

The process industry has always been faced with the challenging tasks of determining the overall unavailability of safety instrumented systems (SISs). The unavailability of the safety instrumented system is quantified by considering the average probability of failure on demand. To mitigate these challenges, the IEC 61508 has established analytical formulas for estimating the average probability of failure on demand for K-out-of-N (KooN) architectures. However, these formulas are limited to the system with identical components and this limitation has not been addressed in many researches. Hence, this paper proposes an unavailability model based on Markov Model for different redundant system architectures with non-identical components and generalised formulas are established for non-identical k-out-of-n and n-out-of-n configurations. Furthermore, the proposed model incorporates undetected failure rate and evaluates its impact on the unavailability quantification of SIS. The accuracy of the proposed model is verified with the existing unavailability methods and it is shown that the proposed approach provides a sufficiently robust result for all system architectures. &nbsp

Quantitative Analysis of a Forest Fragment in Olokemeji Forest Reserve, Nigeria

A phytosociological analysis of a forest fragment in Olokemeji Forest Reserve, Nigeria was carried out using point-centred quarter method. 80 trees belonging to 19 species distributed in 12 families were sampled. The more important/dominant species on the basis of Importance Value ranking were Manilkara obovata, Senna siamea and Anogeissus lieocarpus. The dominance of a few species reflected the early successional status of the forest fragment. Keywords:Nigeria, Olokemeji Forest Reserve, phytosociological analysi