A 20-ha tropical rainforest dynamics plot, located in Xishuangbanna in southwest China's Yunnan Province has been jointly established by the CAS Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden (XTBG) and the Xishuangbanna National Nature Reserve Administration recently. The Plot is the largest of its kind in China.
Initiated in 2006, the Plot program was co-funded by the CAS Biodiversity Committee and XTBG. With the field crew from both XTBG and the Reserve, its main missions are to monitor and study the long-term dynamics of the tropical rainforest ecosystems, so as to understand the origin and maintaining mechanism of species diversity.
The standards set by the Center for Tropical Forest Science under the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute were followed during the construction of the Plot. An arrangement of five hundred 20×20m plots has been finished in forest compartment. The first census made it clear that there are approximately 468 species of trees, including 95,843 individuals with more than 1cm in diameter at breast height. The mapping of distribution patterns of trees within the Plot is in process.
It is slated that the Plot census is to be carried out every five years. (Adopted from a XTBG news report )
