Floristic composition, life form and leaf size spectra of the coal mine area vegetation of darra adam khel, khyber pakhtonkhwa, Pakistan

<p>An Inventory of plant species of Coal Mine area of Darra Adam Khel was prepared on the basis of field trips conducted in different parts of the year 2009, particularly in winter, summer and monsoon. The flora consisted of 54 plant species belonging to 30 families. The dominant families were Asteraceae, Lamiaceae and Solanaceae with 4 species, followed by Euphorbiaceae, Mimosaceae, Moraceae and Zygophyllaceae with 3 species. Each of the Amaranthaceae, Apocynaceae, Capparidaceae, Poaceae, Rhamnaceae, Verbenaceae had 2 species, while the remaining families had a single species. The biological spectrum showed that therophytes (16 spp., 29.6%), megaphanerophytes (14 spp., 25.9%). nanophanerophytes (10 spp., 18.5%), chamaephytes (06 spp., 11.1%), hemicryptophytes (05 spp., 9.26%), Geophytes (03 spp., 5.56%), had occurrence in the investigated area. Leaf spectra of plants consisted of microphylls (50%), mesophylls (25.9%), leptophylls (16.7%), nanophylls (5.56%) and megaphylls (1.85%). The study concludes that the dominance of therophytes indicated that the investigated area was under heavy biotic pressure.