La palma amarga (Sabal mauritiiformis, Arecaeae) en sistemas productivos del Caribe: estudio de caso en Piojó, Atlántico

In order to assess the status of its populations in Piojó (Atlántico department), one of the major leaf producers in the region, palm population structure was studied by randomly establishing 16 0.1 ha sample plots in the three major use areas where the palm occurs: pastures (6), crops (5) and fallows (5). The studied plots included 5,349 individuals, distributed in four size categories. Fallows (3,620 ± 2,808 individuals / ha) and crops (5,612 ± 3,361 ind/ha) had more individuals and population structures that reflect a better condition than pastures (1488 ± 827 ind / ha), which had a population structure with discontinuous distributions due to trampling and foraging. The bitter palm is a resilient species, easily adaptable to disturbed environments. The area studied corresponds to the zone of life dry tropical forest (bs-T) according to the Holdridge system (IGAC, 1977), and to the zonobioma of the dry tropical forest of the Caribbean according to the IDEAM et al. (2007). Sabal mauritiiformis is a palm of solitary stem, of 8 to 25 m in height and 20 to 40 cm in diameter, terminated in a spherical crown composed usually of 10 to 15 costapalmate leaves, supported by petioles of 1 to 2 m in length and 3-4 cm in width. The palm is widely distributed in the Caribbean, from Mexico to Colombia and Venezuela. In Colombia, it is found in the Caribbean region, from the Darién to the south of La Guajira and to the south, from the center of Córdoba to the center of Bolívar and Cesar. Although the Colombian-Venezuelan Caribbean is considered as the lower limit of the distribution of the genus, in the country there are small populations in the inter-Andean valleys, in the departments of Valle del Cauca, Cundinamarca and Tolima (Galeano and Bernal, 2010). The study aimed to contribute to the knowledge of the bitter palm in Colombia through the study of the demographic structure of the populations in Piojó, one of the municipalities with the highest production of bitter palm leaves in the Caribbean coast. The research sought to answer the following questions: how do the density and demographic structure of the bitter palm vary in the different types of land use? Which type of land use do the populations of bitter palm present better conditions? With this information, it is expected to lay the foundations for the future construction of a management plan that strengthens the sustainable use of the species in the Colombian Caribbean. The municipality of Piojó is located in the center-west of the department of Atlántico, in Colombia, at 10º44’ N, and 75º06’ W; it presents an average annual temperature above 24ºC and an average annual rainfall of 1,200 mm, with a bimodal regime, consisting of two periods of rainfall (May-June and August-November) and two dry periods (December-April and June-July), being one of the most rainy municipalities of Atlántico (Alcaldía Municipal de Piojó, 2010). Along the territory, there is a notable effect of the action of the wind, which in some periods of the year can reach up to 25 m/s, mainly during the rainy season (Alcaldía Municipal de Piojó, 2013).