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Traits and functional strategies as predictors of demographic variations over a chronosequence

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Abstract

Traits and functional strategies when related to demographic rates provide important information about the distribution of species and their performance in different environments. Therefore, predictions were made that: (1) plant communities in tropical forests, distributed over a chronosequence, have different trade-offs between demographic rates and functional traits due to variations in light availability and (2) acquisitive, intermediate and conservative species have different demographic rates throughout the chronosequence. To test these predictions, data from eight functional traits (maximum plant height; specific leaf area; leaf dry matter content; leaf nitrogen, phosphorus and chlorophyll concentrations; wood density; and seed shape) were collected from 64 tree species, distributed in six secondary (three 17 and three 25 years old) and three mature (>40 years old) Ombrophilous Dense Forest fragments. Demographic rates (mortality, recruitment and growth) of the species were determined for periods of three and five years, in each forest. Mortality was higher and growth rate was lower in the 17-year-old than in the mature forest, and the acquisitive group had the highest recruiting rate, but interactions were not significant. Thus, the majority of relationships between demographic rates and functional traits did not correspond to the predictions, as some traits were not better predictors of the demography of species in a determined forest than others and that these relationships did not vary across the chronosequence. Therefore, the trade-offs between functional and demographic characteristics are related to the species and not to environmental differences across the age gradient, and when the species are separated into groups, the predicted changes in demography are valid across the gradient.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Instituto Federal de Educacao Ciencia e Tecnologia do Ceara, Quixada - CE, 63902-580, Brazil

    Maria Amanda Menezes Silva, Andréa de Vasconcelos Freitas Pinto, Ladivania Medeiros do Nascimento, Ana Carolina Borges Lins-e-Silva, André Luiz Alves de Lima, Everardo Valadares de Sá Barretto Sampaio & Maria Jesus Nogueira Rodal

  2. Departamento de Engenharia Florestal, Universidade Federal Rural de Pernambuco, Rua Dom Manoel de Medeiros, s/n, Dois Irma˜os, Recife - PE, 52171-900, Brazil

    Andréa de Vasconcelos Freitas Pinto

  3. Departamento de Biologia, Universidade Federal Rural de Pernambuco, Rua Dom Manoel de Medeiros, s/n, Dois Irmãos, Recife - PE, 52171-900, Brazil

    Ladivania Medeiros do Nascimento, Ana Carolina Borges Lins-e-Silva, André Luiz Alves de Lima & Maria Jesus Nogueira Rodal

  4. Departamento de Energia Nuclear, Universidade Federal Rural de Pernambuco, Av. Prof. Moraes Rego, 1235 - Cidade Universitária, Recife - PE, 50670–901, Brazil

    Everardo Valadares de Sá Barretto Sampaio

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  1. Maria Amanda Menezes Silva
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  2. Andréa de Vasconcelos Freitas Pinto
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Correspondence to Maria Amanda Menezes Silva.

Appendix

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Fig. 1
figure 1

Principal component analysis of the eight functional characteristics measured for 64 species of trees. Values in parentheses on the axes are percentages of the calculated variance. Abbreviations for functional characteristics are defined in Table 3

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Silva, M.A.M., Pinto, A.V.F., do Nascimento, L.M. et al. Traits and functional strategies as predictors of demographic variations over a chronosequence. Braz. J. Bot 40, 761–770 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40415-017-0389-9

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