Abstract
In many geographic areas influenced by tropical and temperate climates, nat-ural forest ecosystems have been destroyed in favour of plantations of alloch-thonous trees which are economically profitable for different aspects of thetimber industry. Some of these mature plantations degrade the soils and inhi-bit natural regeneration of the local flora; others, due to the physical con-straints they impose, can contribute to the installation and the developmentof autochthonous taxa. The plantations of Swietenia macrophylla and Swiete-nia xaubrevilleana (Mahoganys) in the Lesser Antilles are part of these pro-cesses. To study the natural regeneration process of forest plant species nativeto Martinique under plantations of Mahoganys, we carried out surveys inthirteen transects (stations) under humid and subhumid bioclimates. The re-sults showed that groups of indigenous species typical of various stages ofplant succession colonise the plots of mature Mahoganys. This study suggeststhat mature plantations of not very competitive introduced forest species mayfavor the succession of plant communities. It would be therefore possible touse these introduced species ( Swietenia macrophylla and Swietenia xaubre-villeana) in reforestation programs of Lesser Antilles biotopes with sylvicul-tural potential degraded by anthropisation.