Abstract
Secondary vegetation (SV) is an important element of the landscape after forest is cleared in Brazilian Amazon. Deforestation maps derived from thematic mapper (TM) imagery were used to sample random areas of old and recent settlement, and small and large farms. TM data were then used to classify SV in the selected areas. Results showed that SV represented higher fractions of the landscape in areas of more recent and small-farm settlement than in areas of old and large-farm settlement. These findings emphasize the importance of considering the long-term evolution of land use systems if the relationship between secondary succession, land rotation and abandonment is to be better understood.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by grants from FAPESP, FINEP/PPG7, LBA-ECO CD17 and LC34, CNPq (Milênio LBA II and INCT) and CAPES.