Although much remains to be known a

Although much remains to be known about the
impact of M. minutifloraon biodiversity, vegetation
structure and ecosystem function in Neotropical
savannas, available data indicate that impacts could be
substantial.Melinis minutifloracommonly forms monodominant stands and produces higher biomass than
native grasses (Hoffmannet al. 2004a), resulting in a
sharp decline in herbaceous species diversity (Berardi
1994; Pivelloet al. 1999b).The high biomass results in
increased fire intensities (Mistry & Berardi 2005)
which should result in higher rates of tree mortality
and topkill (i.e. complete death of aerial biomass), as
has been shown for tropical forests of Hawaii
(D’Antonio et al. 2000), where this species also is
invasive.