Recruitment dynamics of woody species in a North American temperate forest

Author / Creator

Magee, Lukas, author

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Summary

The structure and composition of forests are heavily influenced by the dynamics of early life-history stages of trees and shrubs. Seedlings are particularly susceptible to a multitude of ecological...

The structure and composition of forests are heavily influenced by the dynamics of early life-history stages of trees and shrubs. Seedlings are particularly susceptible to a multitude of ecological factors in the forest understory. Both density dependence and abiotic filtering have been shown to influence the differential establishment, survival, and diversity of woody species. Using data from four censuses over eight years, I analyzed the relative importance of biotic and abiotic predictors of seedling abundance, richness, recruitment, and mortality in 200 1 m x 2 m seedling plots at the 25.2 ha Wabikon Forest Dynamics Plot in northeastern Wisconsin, USA. The survival of seedlings generally decreased with increasing neighborhood density of adult conspecifics, but the strength of this relationship varied across time, species, and growth habit. Overall, more abundant species exhibited higher mortality rates, indicating that density dependence may be an important influence in shaping the long-term community composition of the Wabikon Forest Dynamics Plot. In agreement with other studies of temperate forest ecosystems, my findings suggest that density dependence does not act alone, however; both biotic and abiotic factors such as soil chemistry, moisture, and light availability regulate seedling dynamics in this late-successional mesic forest.

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