DIVERSITY AND DISPERSION PATTERNS OF TREE SPECIES WITHIN HOUSEHOLD FARMLANDS AND OPEN PARKLANDS IN THE TALENSI AREA OF NORTHERN GHANA

Abstract

Ghana is bedeviled with issues related to dwindling natural resources, particularly tree populations. One of the most fundamental problems faced by community ecologists is how to measure the population sizes and distributions of plant species. In the northern Savanna region, the survival of tree species is being threatened by changes in climate and human activities. This chapter examines the diversity of woody tree species in terms of the size of the population and pattern of dispersion in household farmlands and open parklands in the Talensi area of the Upper East Region of Ghana. In total, 839 individual woody trees (652 in household farmlands and 187 in open parklands) belonging to 78 species were identified. The commonly identified species were Adansonia digitata L., Azadirachta indica A. Juss., Ceiba pentandra (L.) Gaertn, Diospyros mespiliformis Hochst. ex A. Rich, Ficus trichopoda Baker, Lannea acida A. Rich, and Mangifera indica L. The variance-to-mean ratios determined for household farmlands and open parklands were 8.97 and 8.99 respectively, indicating clumped dispersion patterns for these tree species in both land types. The findings of this chapter provide a good foundation for ecologists, foresters, developers, and others who are trying to understand the state of tree resources in Ghana in this era of changing climate in order to develop appropriate mitigation strategies.