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Seed rain of fleshy-fruited species in tropical pastures in Los Tuxtlas, Mexico

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 March 2002

Cristina Martínez-Garza  and
Reneé González-Montagut
Cristina Martínez-Garza
Affiliation:
Instituto de Ecología, UNAM. A.P. 70-275 Mexico City, 04510 Mexico
Reneé González-Montagut
Affiliation:
Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA. Current address: Mexican Nature Conservation Fund, Damas No. 49, Mexico City 03900 Mexico.
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Abstract

In abandoned pastures where the seed bank of forest species has been depleted and a seedling bank does not exist, dispersal events are the only source of forest seeds for natural regeneration (Gómez-Pompa & Vázquez-Yanes 1981). Lack of dispersal has been reported as an important limitation for rain-forest regeneration in pastures (Hardwick et al. 1997 in Thailand; Holl 1999 in Costa Rica; Nepstad et al. 1990 in Brazil) or colonization of fallow land (Kollmann 1995). A high percentage of tropical plant species have fleshy fruits that are dispersed by birds and flying and terrestrial mammals (Howe & Smallwood 1982, Snow 1981). In this study we report the spatial distribution of fleshy-fruited species dispersed to tropical pastures at different distances from the vegetation border in 12 tropical pastures as a measure of the instant regenerative potential of these sites.

Keywords

Cecropia obtusifoliaFicus eugeniaefoliaLos Tuxtlasnatural regenerationriparian forestseed dispersaltropical rain forest
Type
Brief Report
Information
Journal of Tropical Ecology , Volume 18 , Issue 3 , May 2002 , pp. 457 - 462
Copyright
2002 Cambridge University Press

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