EFFECT OF HABITAT TYPE ON FLORISTIC DIVERSITY ON SAUDI UNIVERSITY CAMPUSES AS URBAN HABITATS

Urban biodiversity has become more important due to the increasing impacts of urbanization on natural ecological systems.Campuses of universities are urban places with a high concentration of people and a variety of habitat types.This study, which is the first of its kind in Saudi Arabia, sought to investigate how various ecosystems affect plant diversity on university campuses.We selected Princess Nourah bint Abdulrahman University (NC) and Taif University (TC), two universities situated in two distinct regions.Six distinct habitats were identified on university campuses, and their floristic compositions were examined.On both campuses, the data showed that there were 159 species, representing 118 genera and 38 families.The number of species, genera, and families in the TC was 3.3%, 15.7%, and 40% greater than that of the NC, respectively.Twenty families were represented by a single species, but 33.3% of the documented species belonged to the Poaceae and Asteraceae groups.Plant diversity is greatly influenced by habitat type; in the TC, the humid, fertile soil environment had the highest species count (52 species), whereas in NC, the habitat is sandy, arid surroundings had the highest species count (42 species).The life forms and chorotypes of the recorded species and their distribution in the different habitats on the two campuses are presented.The current results show the great plant diversity of Saudi university compounds, which highlights the importance of the role of these habitats in preserving biodiversity.