Environmental drivers of vascular and non-vascular epiphyte abundance in tropical premontane cloud forests in Northern Peru

Autor: Lassi Suominen, Mirkka M. Jones, Gabriel Trujillo Paucar, Johanna M. Toivonen, Carlos A. Gonzales-Inca
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2017
Předmět:
Zdroj: Journal of Vegetation Science. 28
ISSN: 1100-9233
Popis: Questions What is the role of microclimate relative to easily-obtainable measures of forest structure in explaining epiphyte abundance? Do these roles differ between epiphytic plant groups? Location Tropical premontane cloud forests of the Alto Mayo watershed, Northern Peru (S 5°40’-6°10’; W 77°00’-77°40’), 1020-1450 m a.s.l. Methods We recorded vascular epiphytic abundance, epiphytic bryophyte cover and forest structural features in 36 plots (20 m x 20 m), and measured air temperature and humidity in a subset of 17 plots. We modelled bryophyte cover, total vascular epiphytic abundance, and the abundances of the main vascular epiphytic groups separately (bromeliads, aroids, ferns), as a function of forest structure and microclimate in spatial autoregressive models. Three forest structural variables (basal area, tree height and canopy openness) and two microclimatic variables (minimum humidity and maximum temperature) were considered. We constructed all possible combinations of maximum two-variable models from the five explanatory variables and carried out Akaike's Information Criterion-based model selection and variable importance tests with these as input models. Results Canopy openness was the most important variable explaining the abundance of the main epiphytic plant groups. It was also strongly correlated with stand microclimate. Therefore, predictions of epiphyte abundance did not improve with the inclusion of microclimatic data in the models. There were some differences among the epiphytic plant groups in their response to microclimate and forest structural features. Conclusions Forest stand microclimate, reflected through canopy openness in particular, was a main determinant of the distributions of all epiphyte plant groups. This implies that easily-measurable forest structural variables alone can be used as good predictors of epiphyte abundance. Taxon-specific differences in responses to microclimate imply that these taxa may also differ in their sensitivity to predicted future changes in temperature and rainfall. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
Databáze: OpenAIRE
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