Habitat partitioning among neotropical pioneers: a consequence of differential susceptibility to browsing herbivores?

Four species of fast-growing pioneer tree species in the genus Cecropia exist in the forests in central Panama. Cecropia insignis is dominant in old-growth forests but absent from nearby secondary forests; C. obtusifolia, and C. peltata are abundant in secondary forests but rare in old-growth forest, and C. longipes is uncommon in both. To determine whether Cecropia habitat associations are a consequence of local dispersal or differences in recruitment success, we grew seedlings of these species in common gardens in large treefall gaps in secondary and old-growth forest. In contrast to the observed adult distribution, only C. insignis grew significantly over 16 months in secondary forests; remaining species were heavily browsed by herbivores. C. insignis also grew and survived best in old-growth forest. Differences in susceptibility to herbivory did not result from an ant defence mutualism; none of the plants were colonised by ants during the experiment. To test whether C. insignis, the species least susceptible to herbivory, trades off investment in growth in favour of defence, we also grew the four Cecropia species in a screened growing house under light conditions comparable to large forest gaps. Contrary to expectation, species growth rates were similar; only C. peltata grew significantly faster than C. insignis. These results suggest that (1) conditions in ~40-year-old secondary forests no longer support the recruitment of Cecropia species, which are canopy dominants there; and (2) among congeners, differences in plant traits with little apparent cost to growth can have large impacts on recruitment by affecting palatability to herbivores.

Attribution of net carbon change by disturbance type across forest lands of the conterminous United States.

BACKGROUND: Locating terrestrial sources and sinks of carbon (C) will be critical to developing strategies that contribute to the climate change mitigation goals of the Paris Agreement. Here we present spatially resolved estimates of net C change across United States (US) forest lands between 2006 and 2010 and attribute them to natural and anthropogenic processes. RESULTS: Forests in the conterminous US sequestered -460 ± 48 Tg C year-1, while C losses from disturbance averaged 191 ± 10 Tg C year-1. Combining estimates of net C losses and gains results in net carbon change of -269 ± 49 Tg C year-1. New forests gained -8 ± 1 Tg C year-1, while deforestation resulted in losses of 6 ± 1 Tg C year-1. Forest land remaining forest land lost 185 ± 10 Tg C year-1 to various disturbances; these losses were compensated by net carbon gains of -452 ± 48 Tg C year-1. C loss in the southern US was highest (105 ± 6 Tg C year-1) with the highest fractional contributions from harvest (92%) and wind (5%). C loss in the western US (44 ± 3 Tg C year-1) was due predominantly to harvest (66%), fire (15%), and insect damage (13%). The northern US had the lowest C loss (41 ± 2 Tg C year-1) with the most significant proportional contributions from harvest (86%), insect damage (9%), and conversion (3%). Taken together, these disturbances reduced the estimated potential C sink of US forests by 42%. CONCLUSION: The framework presented here allows for the integration of ground and space observations to more fully inform US forest C policy and monitoring efforts.

Regeneration niche partitioning in neotropical pioneers: effects of gap size, seasonal drought and herbivory on growth and survival.

Adaptive trade-offs underlie the specialisation that permits habitat partitioning in species rich plant communities. We investigated the influence of the trade-offs that determine differences in growth and survival among six species of neotropical pioneer trees in gaps in semideciduous forest in Panama. Seedlings of Miconia argentea, Cecropia insignis, Luehea seemannii, Trema micrantha, Ochroma pyramidale and Croton bilbergianus were planted into artificial small (25 m(2)), medium (64 m(2)) and large (225 m(2)) gaps in secondary forest in the Barro Colorado Nature Monument. Trema and Ochroma suffered >/=50% mortality across all gap sizes, while Cecropia had high mortality only during the dry season and in the small gaps, and Miconia and Croton suffered low to zero mortality across all environments. The highest growth rates in large gaps were attained by Cecropia seedlings and in the smaller gaps by Miconia seedlings, although there were indications that Trema and Ochroma required gaps that were larger than any used in this study. Variation in growth and mortality could not be attributed to differences in foliar herbivore damage. Instead, there was strong evidence of a trade-off between maximum growth in the wet season and the ability to survive seasonal drought, particularly in small gaps. We conclude that variation in allocation in response to multiple limiting resources may be as important as allocation to growth and defence in determining the habitat preferences of neotropical pioneers.