Ecología y conservación de los bosques y arbustales de Polylepis: ¿qué sabemos y qué ignoramos?

Abstract

Polylepis forests, endemic to the Andes of South America, are generally associated to relatively inaccessible sites such as ravines, rocky or steep slopes. The reasons for this association have been widely debated and could be of abiotic origin such as humidity, temperature or winds, or due to anthropogenic origin such as protection from browsing by domestic cattle, felling or human ignited fires. We performed a quantitative review on the ecology and conservation of Polylepis forests with the objective of summarizing the state of the art in this topic. We identified 139 relevant publications; 36% were concentrated in Argentina. The publications include 20 of the ~27 existing species; the most studied were P. australis and P. tarapacana, with 45 and 21 publications, respectively. In the opposite extreme, there were 7 species without publications. The most popular disciplines were population ecology (35%) and studies on biodiversity and communities (18%). Very few studies of the same type were repeated from one region to the other. The studies that attempt to quantify the relative contribution of abiotic and anthropogenic factors in restricting forest to inaccessible sites show a stronger contribution of human impact, but are all concentrated in the south of distribution of Polylepis forest in Argentina. We suggest research vacancy areas and possible improvements in the production of new publications and in the network of interactions between researchers interested in Polylepis ecosystems.