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Lecturer(s)
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Štech Milan, doc. Ing. Ph.D.
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Course content
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Content of lectures: 1. Tropical environment (climate, soils, seasonality) and differences from temperate regions. Climate diagrams. 2. Tropical biota. Tropical biomes. Deserts, savannas, tropical forests, mangroves, tropical wetlands and high mountains, inselbergs. Adaptations of tropical plants. 3. Plant geography of the tropics. Distribution of plants across tropical regions. Pantropical plant groups. Floristic kingdoms of the tropics: Paleotropical, Neotropical, Australian, Cape. 4. Key tropical plant taxa. Significant or remarkable families and genera of tropical plants. Pteridophytes (e.g. Marattiaceae, Cyatheaceae), Gymnosperms (e.g. Araucariaceae, Podocarpaceae, Cycadaceae, Gnetaceae), Dicots (e.g. Dipterocarpaceae, Gesneriaceae, Myrtaceae, Combretaceae, Mimosaceae, Ficus, Adansonia, Rafflesia, Victoria), Monocots (e.g. Arecaceae, Bromeliaceae, Zingiberaceae). 5. Useful tropical plants. Principal groups of useful tropical plants with emphasis on less known and noteworthy species. 6. Nature conservation in tropics. Key problems of nature conservation in tropical regions. Important organisations and nature conservation projects. International cooperation in nature and biodiversity conservation. Content of practicals: Basically a seminar where students deliver their own presentations. Topics of the presentations are chosen beforehand and cover all the key topics of the course. Work with plant collections (herbaria, dried fruits, living specimens) is a part of the practicals.
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Learning activities and teaching methods
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Monologic (reading, lecture, briefing), Dialogic (discussion, interview, brainstorming)
- Preparation for classes
- 14 hours per semester
- Class attendance
- 30 hours per semester
- Preparation for exam
- 30 hours per semester
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Learning outcomes
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The main objective of the lecture is to briefly introduce tropical flora and vegetation with its specific features and differences from flora and vegetation of other regions of Earth.
Students will have acquired basic knowledge of key tropical plant taxa and differences in their regional distribution. The students should be able to identify and classify key tropical plant taxa including useful plants and they should understand evolutionary and geographical relationships of flora in global scale. The students also should understand and should be able to explain basic factors determining vegetation of tropics, elementary structural traits of tropical ecosystems as well as the main problems of tropical biodiversity and its conservation.
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Prerequisites
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Basic high school knowledge from the botanical systematics, morphology and anatomy.
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Assessment methods and criteria
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Written examination
Knowledge about regions of tropical flora, about diversity and ecology of tropical plants and tropical plant families and its use.
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Recommended literature
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Heywood V. H., Brummitt R. K., Culham A. & Seberg O. (2007): Flowering Plant Families of the World. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew..
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Lomolino M. V., Riddle B. R., Whittaker R. J., Brown, J. H. (2010): Biogeography, 4th ed. Sinauer Associates..
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Maas P. J & Westra L. Y. T. (1998): Neotropical Plant Families: A concise guide to families of vascular plants in the Neotropics. 2nd ed. Koeltz Scientific Books..
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Morley R. J. (2000): Origin and Evolution of Tropical Rain Forests. John Wiley & Sons, London..
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Osborne P. J. (2000): Tropical Ecosystems and Ecological Concepts. Cambridge Univ. Press., Cambridge..
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Richards P. W. (1998): The Tropical Rainforest. Cambridge Univ. Press., Cambridge..
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Valíček P. et al. (2002): Užitkové rostliny tropů a subtropů. Praha: Academia..
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Whitmore T. M. (1998): An Introduction to Tropical Rain Forests, 2nd edition. Oxford Univ. Press., Oxford..
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