The degradation of forest areas in Morocco: Case of Benslimane province

This article aims to shed light on the process of known degradation of the forest area of Benslimane province during the period 1990–2020 and to specify the most important human causes which contributed to it (quarries, extension of the built-up area, the impact of agricultural activities, grazing and collection of firewood), by using remote sensing techniques (spatial images for the years 1990–2000–2010–2020) to produce Land Cover maps. The following satellite images were used, Landsat 5 TM, Landsat 7 ETM+ and Landsat 8 OLI, with a spatial precision of 30 m, the Semi-Automatic Classification Plugin (SCP) in QGIS was used for atmospheric correction, and the Spectral Angle Mapping algorithm for the images’ classification. The rating evaluation of the Kappa coefficient shows the following ratios for the years 1990–2000–2010–2020 respectively ; 0.89–0.90–0.90–0.93. The results showed that the forest area of Benslimane province has declined by 11.4% or about 6,027.7 ha between 1990–2020 at the rate of 200 ha/year, which has been turned into matorral land or bare land. This forest also lost 35.2% of its vegetative density and has become much sparser, while the original grazing areas surrounding it have been reduced by 50.4%. Moreover, the area of quarries increased by 1,097.4%, the percentage of built-up area increased by 328.2%, and the agricultural area expanded by 32.7%. These results can be used as preliminary data for future studies and can help policymakers focus on the real drivers of forest degradation, in order to develop interventions to ensure the sustainability of natural resources

Impact of climate change on forest resources: Case of Quercus rotundifolia, Tetraclinis articulata, Juniperus phoenicea, J. oxycedrus, J. thurifera and Pinus halepensis

Forest resources in the Ourika watershed are subject to several anthropogenic and climatic degradation factors. As for the human factor, this degradation of forest resources is explained by the bad practices exercised by the local population expressed by the cutting of live wood, carbonization, and overgrazing. In terms of the climatic factor, the decrease in the amount of rainfall and the increase in temperature contribute to the exacerbation of the degradation of these resources. In order to better understand the evolution of plant cover in a changing climate context, this study highlights an assessment of the impact of climate change on forest dynamics based on a process-based model at the forest landscape scale which makes it possible to simulate the changes according to growth, succession, disturbances (fire, wind, insects, etc), forest management, and land use change. This analysis is based on the use of the LANDIS-II model and the PnET-succession extension. Projections of the dynamics of forest communities are made using climate projections from the Japanese global circulation model adopted by Morocco (model for interdisciplinary research on climate – earth system models) and this by adopting the two climate scenarios , representative concentration pathways 4.5 and 8.5. The results obtained highlight the spatial distribution of the ecosystems studied after 100 years with a quantitative evaluation of the total average biomass of these resources as a function of climatic disturbances. In general, the estimated total biomass will decline over the coming years under the joint effect of the climate change and the aging of forest stands, while on the other hand, the distribution of potential areas for species settlement remains independent of the effect of these climate changes

Species diversity of Pleosporalean taxa associated with Camellia sinensis (L.) Kuntze in Taiwan

Abstract Pleosporales species are important plant pathogens, saprobes, and endophytes on a wide range of economically important plant hosts. The classification of Pleosporales has undergone various modifications in recent years due to the addition of many families described from multiple habitats with a high level of morphological deviation. Numerous asexual genera have been described in Pleosporales that can be either hyphomyceteous or coelomycetous. Phoma- or coniothyrium-like species are common and have been revealed as polyphyletic in the order Pleosporales and linked with several sexual genera. A total of 31 pleosporalean strains were isolated in different regions of Taiwan between 2017 and 2018 from the leaves of Camellia sinensis plants with symptoms of leaf spot disease. These strains were evaluated morphologically and genotypically using multi-locus sequence analyses of the ITS, LSU, SSU, rpb2, tef1 and tub2 genes. The results demonstrated the affiliation of these strains with the various families in Pleosporales and revealed the presence of one new genus (Neoshiraia) and eight new species (Alloconiothyrium camelliae, Amorocoelophoma camelliae, Leucaenicola camelliae, L. taiwanensis, Neoshiraia camelliae, N. taiwanensis, Paraconiothyrium camelliae and Paraphaeosphaeria camelliae). Furthermore, to the best of our understanding, Didymella segeticola, Ectophoma pomi and Roussoella mexican were reported for the first time from C. sinensis in Taiwan

Molecular phylogenetic diversity and biological characterization of diaporthe species associated with leaf spots of camellia sinensis in Taiwan

Camellia sinensis is one of the major crops grown in Taiwan and has been widely cultivated around the island. Tea leaves are prone to various fungal infections, and leaf spot is considered one of the major diseases in Taiwan tea fields. As part of a survey on fungal species causing leaf spots on tea leaves in Taiwan, 19 fungal strains morphologically similar to the genus Diaporthe were collected. ITS (internal transcribed spacer), tef1-α (translation elongation factor 1-α), tub2 (beta-tubulin), and cal (calmodulin) gene regions were used to construct phylogenetic trees and determine the evolutionary relationships among the collected strains. In total, six Diaporthe species, including one new species, Diaporthe hsinchuensis, were identified as linked with leaf spot of C. sinensis in Taiwan based on both phenotypic characters and phylogeny. These species were further characterized in terms of their pathogenicity, temperature, and pH requirements under laboratory conditions. Diaporthe tulliensis, D. passiflorae, and D. perseae were isolated from C. sinensis for the first time. Furthermore, pathogenicity tests revealed that, with wound inoculation, only D. hongkongensis was pathogenic on tea leaves. This investigation delivers the first assessment of Diaporthe taxa related to leaf spots on tea in Taiwan