Diversity of plant communities and leaf heavy metal content at Luiswishi copper/cobalt mineralization, Upper Katanga, Dem. Rep. Congo

The site has been visited in 1926 by Walter Robyns, but was never studied in detail despite its location near Lubumbashi and its differences from the famous site of the ""Mine de l'Etoile"". Some seven different plant communities were identified, all controlled by the nature of the substratum and its chemical composition. The site is important in that it includes some plants unknown from other mineralized sites in Katanga (Aristolochia heppii, Pimpinella acutidentata, Trachyandra sp., Annona stenophylla subsp. nana, Gnidia hockii). The site even contains two endemic plants (Bulbostylis fusiformis and Faroa chalcophila), each only known from one other metalliferous site. This study completes the former synthesis by Malaisse in 1995 and presents a new phytogeochemical transect across a Katangian copper/cobalt anomaly