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Land cover dynamics in Osa Region, Costa Rica: secondary forest is here to stay

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Abstract

Although high deforestation rates are documented in Latin America, there are also significant signs of secondary forest regrowth. In this study, we analyze the land cover dynamics in the Osa Peninsula region of Costa Rica between 1987 and 2009 that provides a good scenario for evaluating the effects over forest trends of the environmental policies set up in 1996. Remote sensing imagery from Landsat and SPOT 2 satellites was classified using the See5 algorithm to obtain land cover maps for 1987, 1998, 2003 and 2009. Our results show that land cover changes in Osa County are driven by grassland/forest dynamics. Forest area diminished over the 1987–1998 period, whereas it increased by 5 and 6 % during the 1998–2003 and 2003–2009 periods, respectively. Grassland abandonment was identified as the main driver of the net increase in forest cover area. Fragmentation analysis was done over the forest class of these maps disclosing secondary forest of the persistent forest of each period. Persistent forest patches decrease in number, but increase in size through time, forming areas of persistent forest established in bigger patches with lower edge density. Secondary forest patches have increased in number and size, forming larger areas of forest established in bigger patches. Nearly half of the reforested area in the period 1987–2009 remained as secondary forest in 2009, playing a key role by decreasing forest fragmentation and strengthening the natural corridor connecting the conservation areas of the region.

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Acknowledgments

This research was funded by MACOSACEN project, financed by PCI-AECID (Agencia Española de Cooperación Internacional). The authors are very grateful to the Natural Resource Laboratory at CIA-UCR for their support and assistance in Costa Rica. The authors also thank Jesús Fernández Moya and Adam Collins for their help and comments about English language and three anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments to the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Departamento de ingeniería y morfología del terreno, Escuela de Caminos, Canales y Puertos, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, C/Profesor Aranguren s/n, 28040, Madrid, Spain

    Nur Algeet-Abarquero & Miguel Marchamalo

  2. Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada

    Arturo Sánchez-Azofeifa

  3. Centro de Investigaciones en Ciencias Atómicas, Nucleares y Moleculares, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica

    Javier Bonatti

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  1. Nur Algeet-Abarquero
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  2. Arturo Sánchez-Azofeifa
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Correspondence to Nur Algeet-Abarquero.

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Algeet-Abarquero, N., Sánchez-Azofeifa, A., Bonatti, J. et al. Land cover dynamics in Osa Region, Costa Rica: secondary forest is here to stay. Reg Environ Change 15, 1461–1472 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10113-014-0714-9

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