BANGLADESH JOURNAL OF FOREST SCIENCE
A Half-yearly Peer Reviewed Journal of Bangladesh Forest Research Institute
A Half-yearly Peer Reviewed Journal of Bangladesh Forest Research Institute
The paper reviews information on climate changes, status of forests, biodiversity
and vulnerability of biological resources in Bangladesh particularly in mangrove areas.
Atmospheric concentration of green house gases modifies the global and regional climates
and consequently affects adversely the environment ofBangladesh. There may be increase in
temperature, rainfall and frequency of cyclones, and sea level rise in the coast ofBangladesh.
The country is likely to experience repeated flooding, cyclones, tidal surges, soil erosion,
heavy sedimentation,salinity increase and prolonged drought
The paper reviews information on climate changes, status of forests, biodiversity
and vulnerability of biological resources in Bangladesh particularly in mangrove areas.
The atmospheric concentration of green house gases modifies the global and regional climates
and consequently affects adversely the environment of Bangladesh. There may be an increase in
temperature, rainfall and frequency of cyclones, and sea level rise in the coast ofBangladesh.
The country is likely to experience repeated flooding, cyclones, tidal surges, soil erosion,
heavy sedimentation,salinity increase and prolonged drought.
The forest covers 17% of the total area of Bangladesh but only 7.7% are under
closed tree cover. With regard to biodiversity, the plant kingdom supports about 5,000
angiospermic species including 10% trees, 35% shrubs and woody climbers and 50% herbs.
The mangrovesinclude 70 species of plant. About animals, the mammals comprise 50 species,
birds 275, reptiles 50 and amphibians 8 species compared to 110 species of mammals, 628
birds, 109 reptiles and 22 amphibians in the entire Bangladesh. Considerable number of
plant and animal species is threatened with disappearance due to human pressure, and the
situation will aggravate with changing climate. Extinction or migration ofspecialized plants
and animals will take place with regular flooding, increasing soilsalinity and other ecological
changes. Probable impact of sea level rise in the coastal areas on forests and biodiversity is
unknown. For living organisms, it may be possible to overcome small and gradualsea level
rise but will disappear in case of abrupt change.
Keora (Sonneratia apetala Buch.-Ham.) is a
pioneer species in coastal areas of Bangladesh
(Siddiqi 2001). It alone constitutes 94.4% of the
existing mangrove plantations (Siddiqi and
Shahjalal 1997) because of its high survival and
growth in the newly accreted land. However, the
information on flowering, fruiting and seed
collection are very little. There was no systematic
study in this context. So, for a clear understanding
about the phenology of keora a study over a period
of 12 monthsfrom January to December 1996 was
conducted in the coastal plantation ofKattoli under
Chittagong Coastal Afforestation Division.
Hybridization of Acacia auriculiformis and
Acacia mangium occurs naturally because both are
pollen-pistil compatible, found within the same
habitat with overlapping flowering time and share
common pollinators (Zakaria 1991). Natural hybrids
of these two species are reported in Sabah
(Tham 1976) and Papua New Guinea (Turnbull
et al. 1986). The tree form of the hybrid of these two
species is satisfactory because of better stem
straightness, self-pruning stability, better stem
circularity and more disease resistance (FRIM
1992). Species/provenance trials of A auriculiformis
and A. mangium were established at Charkai,
Dinajpur, Bangladesh in 1983,1985 and 1987 at a
spacing of 1.83 m x 1.83 m covering an area of 1 ha.
The seeds were imported from Australia for these
trial plantations. Eight hybrid trees of these two
fast growing tree species were observed in the
plantation raised in 1983. The hybrids found sporadically
distributed in the plantations were identified
by the light colour of their bark. Banik et al.
(1995) also reported some hybrids of these two
species at Harbang forest areas of Chittagong
Forest Division. Some phenological information
and growth performance of these hybrids found
at Charkai are reported in this paper.
The phenological observations of the hybrids
were made very carefully every day for a period of
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