摘要：This study examined the species richness, diversity, biomass of grasses and herbaceous plantsand seed germination in plots with contrasting disturbance regimes established in a dambogarden, in Chiota, Zimbabwe. The disturbance regimes were burning, clipping, clearing andconventional tillage and were applied annually to each subplot from 2010 to 2012. It washypothesised that burning increases biomass, species richness and diversity of plants whilereducing seed bank diversity. Clearing, clipping and conventionally tilling negatively affectbiomass, species richness and diversity. The Shannon–Wiener Index was used to estimatespecies diversity and the average values obtained ranged 0.53, 0.85, 0.91, 1.3 and 1.70, for theundisturbed, burnt, conventionally tilled, clipped and cleared plots, respectively. The biomassin the experiment ranged from 0.92t ha–1 for the ploughed plot to 20.92t ha–1 for theundisturbed plot. The species richness for the plants decreased in the following order;clearing>conventional tillage>burning>clipping>undisturbed. These results show that disturbance regimes increased species richness but however decreased plant biomass. It is apparent that the management practice that ensures maximum biomass of grasses and herbs indambos is maintaining them in their natural state. However, clearing seemed to improvespecies diversity compared to maintaining the dambo in its natural state.
