Abstract
The artificial lucidophyllous forest at the Miyazaki-Jingu Shrine, which was afforested about 100 years ago, has been preserved as fragmented forest in the city center of Miyazaki. We investigated the species composition, species richness, and life-form spectra of this artificial lucidophyllous forest and compared these factors among the four types of lucidophyllous forest (artificial, secondary, natural, and primeval forest) present in central Miyazaki Prefecture. In the artificial lucidophyllous forest, we observed 118 component species of lucidophyllous forests, including several endangered species. Of these 118 species, many shrubs and herbs had been dispersed by birds from the gardens of adjacent homes. Based on the formula, logS=1.16+0.20logA (where S is the number of species, and A is the area of the forest), derived from a study of the fragmented lucidophyllous forests in central Miyazaki Prefecture, the number of component lucidophyllous forest species was calculated as 158.6 at the Miyazaki-Jingu Shrine. The lower number of observed species, as compared to the number of calculated species, was likely to be due to the simple micro-scale geomorphic conditions at the Miyazaki-Jingu Shrine. The species richness (mean number of component species of lucidophyllous forests per 100m^2 stand) of the artificial lucidophyllous forest was lower than that of natural and primeval lucidophyllous forests but was similar to that of secondary lucidophyllous forests. In terms of life-form spectra, the Miyazaki-Jingu Shrine artificial lucidophyllous forest was characterized by the absence of vascular epiphytes and the scarcity of ferns.
