A quick and effective trait-based protocol for selecting appropriate native plant species for the reforestation of degraded tropical mines

Introduction A critical issue in tropical forests is that anthropogenic deforestation (i.e., mining) degrades the integrity of its ecosystem. Reforestation with appropriate native plant species helps to alleviate these detrimental impacts. A protocol to select appropriate plant species for this purpose currently lacks efficacy and timeliness.Methods We provided a trait-based protocol to quickly and effectively select native plant species for mining reforestation. A 0.2-km2 area of Baopoling (BPL) at Hainan Island, China, was used as a study site, which has been severely degraded by 20 years of limestone mining for cement production. First, we identified the tree species in nearby undisturbed tropical forests, followed by evaluating the similarities in functional traits of the most dominant one (target species) and 60 local candidate native plant species (candidate species) whose saplings can be purchased from a local market.Results and discussion This dataset was used in our trait-based protocol, and only within 1 month, we successfully selected eight plant species which are very similar to target species from the 60 candidate species. We also quantified whether the eight selected plant species were indeed suitable for sustained reforestation by testing their effects on landscape and also their survival rate and recruitment ability after using them to perform reforestation in BPL from 2016 to 2023. Finally, these eight plant species are indeed suitable for reforestation due to their huge influences on a significant shift from originally degraded landscape (comprising only barren rocks) to a forest landscape totally and also their high survival rate (90%-97%) and ability for natural recruitment after 7 years' reforestation in BPL. Thus, we anticipate that this protocol would be integral to species selection during reforestation of tropical mining areas.