OZCAR-RI OZC-R Forêt de Mare Longue - France

Mare Longue Forest is located in the South East of the island of La Réunion (French overseas, Indian Ocean) on the municipality of Saint-Philippe. It is the last remnant of lowland tropical rainforest for the Mascarene archipelago, located on a 364 year-old lava flow. The climate is warm (annual mean temperature ranges from 19 to 25 °C) and humid ( in summer reaching 90 to 95 % of relative humidity), precipitation varying between 408 mm at 130 m a.s.l to 18 000 mm at 1600 m a.s.l. Since 1958, a biological reserve of 21 ha has been established, which was then extended into a natural reserve in 1981, it is now since 2007 under the protection of the National Park of Réunion. The site is composed of a variety of forest habitats, from a primary forest with high diversity in woody plants (more than 50 species of indigenous and endemic species) and epiphytes with a 20 m canopy height, to planted forests of monospecific indigenous species, plantations of vanilla in forest, coastal vegetation. The forest of Mare Longue, in the only corridor land to sea on the island between 0 to 2600 m, with uninterrupted vegetation and where the impact of human is recent (from 1665). In the native forest 3 ha permanent plots have been monitored (MALO1 since 1990, MALO2 since 1999 and MALO3 since 2003) where all trees (> 50 000) are inventoried, tagged and measured for their diameters. A climatic station in the native forest at 250 m has been operating since 2011. In the closest town, the Research forest station of Mare Longue is welcoming researchers and students for their scientific stay on the island with all needed facilities.