Search

Mediterranean communities have been historically conditioned by fire and have therefore developed adaptive traits. Serotiny is a strategy that increases fire resilience by storing seeds in the canopy, protecting them from heat and delaying their dispersion. Aleppo pine is an important serotinous tree species in the low altitude, near-coastal Mediterranean Basin. Differences in serotinous and non-serotinous cones have been detected previously but in order to resolve a gap in the knowledge on seed adaptation to fire, we focused this study on two fire-prone habitats in southern Italy. Several cones were sampled and opened in an oven at two different temperatures in order to group seeds according to provenance and cone type (serotinous or non-serotinous). The sampled seeds were weighed and their coats were removed. Seed size, embryo diameter and nutritive tissue thickness were recorded. We found that seeds with greater weight and size came from the more humid site and from non-serotinous cones. Also, we observed wax and cutine cells formed a thicker seed coat in seeds from the more humid site using a scanning electron microscope. The scanning electron microscopy/energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy showed higher Si and Ca concentrations in the covers of serotinous seeds. Seeds from different provenance and cone types have anatomic and morphological differences that confer different properties against heating. This knowledge can improve post-fire management and promote restoration tools.

Given the multiplicity of products, human activity over the past thousand years has strongly interacted with pine forest distribution. The results of human activity and its impact on the pine forests is a problem that began in the past, when wood and pine ecosystems were not valued, and whose repercussions are still felt today; notably in changes in fire regime, in grazing/browsing intensity, in harvesting, in land use, in plantation activity, in expansion of forest/urban interface, and in secondary urban settlements. Conservation, in this sense, means the maintenance of and the restoration or improvement of the abiotic and biotic features, which form the habitat of a species, as well as controlling activities, which may indirectly result in the deterioration of such habitats. Conservation, therefore, ranges from the conservation of genetic resources in several forms (seed banks, seed forests, conservation in situ of relic populations), to the elimination of human induced disturbances, to the planning of new activities, to the application of proper silvicultural tending and the pursuance of international Conventions, Regulations and Resolutions. The aim of this paper is to emphasise the main legislative tools, which are represented by the array of Conventions, Directives, Regulations and Resolutions concerning the environment and the ecological networks (NATURA 2000, EMERALD, EUNIS).