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Tropical Forest Healers and Habitat Preference

As Preferências dos Curandeiros nas Matas Tropicals

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Abstract

Tropical forests represent repositories of medicinal plant species and indigenous ethnomedical knowledge. These biotic and cognitive resources are threatened by forest removal and culture change. It has, however, yet to be demonstrated quantitatively that tropical pharmacopoeias are concentrated in primary as opposed to disturbed forests, nor that folk ethnomedical knowledge is disappearing. I examined these questions by means of a useful species enumeration of 1-hectare primary and secondary forest plots, and a survey of the regional plant pharmacopoeia of the Atlantic forests of Bahia, Brazil, a region that has witnessed significant human and biological modification.

Healers demonstrated a strong preference for disturbed over primary forest. Second growth forest plots yielded 2.7 times the number of medicinal species identified in primary forest plots. The regional survey likewise elicited an ethnoflora characterized by herbaceous, weedy, cultivated, and exotic taxa. These results may reflect the availability and intrinsic medicinal value of disturbance species, as well as the increasing rarity of the region’s primary forests. They may also represent the long term outcome of culture change, cognitive erosion, and reformulation of the region’s perceived healing flora.

Resumen

As florestas tropicais representam e desempenham a função de depósitos onde se encontram várias espécies de plantas medicinais e um grande conhecimento etnobotânico indígena. Devido no entonto ao desflorestamento e á transformação cultural ocorrida, fontes deste deste conhecimento profundo, e também dos recursos biológicos, encontram-se em perigo de futuro desaparecimento. Ao mesmo tempo, aínda não foi demonstrado quantitivamente que as farmacopéias tropicais estejam concentradas em floresta primária, que a sabedoria popular sobre estas plantas esteja desaparecendo.

Uma enumeração de espécies úteis foi realizada em terreno florestal na mata atlântica da Bahia, Brasil. Para isso foram usados lotes de um hectare da floresta primária e um hectare da floresta já cultivado anteriormente. Ao mesmo tempo fez-se um recenseamento da farmacopéia vegetal da região.

Os resultados destas experiências mostraram que as plantas medicinais são mais abundantes nas áreas já pertubadas que nas áreas virgens. Um inquérito etnobotânico da região mostrou também que a flora medicinal é fundamentalmente herbácea, ervanária, cultivada e exótica. Esses resultados talvez indiqeum a disponibilidade e valor medicinal das plantas que ocorrem nas áreas pertubadas. Outro fator é a dificuldade de encontrar matas virgens. É também possível que essa preferência reflita as mudanças culturais e, ao longo prazo, a destruição de conhecimentos básicos sobre as propriedades medicinais da floresta primária.

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  1. Department of Geography, California State University, 92634, Fullerton, CA

    R. A. Voeks

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Voeks, R.A. Tropical Forest Healers and Habitat Preference. Econ Bot 50, 381–400 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02866520

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