LETTER

Phylogenetic density dependence and environmental filtering predict seedling mortality in a tropical forest

  1. C. E. Timothy Paine1,*,
  2. Natalia Norden2,3,
  3. Jérôme Chave4,
  4. Pierre-Michel Forget5,
  5. Claire Fortunel6,
  6. Kyle G. Dexter4,
  7. Christopher Baraloto6,7

Article first published online: 18 OCT 2011

DOI: 10.1111/j.1461-0248.2011.01705.x

Issue

Ecology Letters

Ecology Letters

Volume 15, Issue 1, pages 34–41, January 2012

Additional Information

How to Cite

Paine, C. E. T., Norden, N., Chave, J., Forget, P.-M., Fortunel, C., Dexter, K. G. and Baraloto, C. (2012), Phylogenetic density dependence and environmental filtering predict seedling mortality in a tropical forest. Ecology Letters, 15: 34–41. doi: 10.1111/j.1461-0248.2011.01705.x

Author Information

  1. 1

    AgroParisTech, UMR “Ecologie des Forêts de Guyane”, 97387, Kourou Cedex, French Guiana

  2. 2

    Departamento de Ciencias Biológicas, Universidad de los Andes, Cra. 1 # 18A-10, Bogotá, D. C., Colombia

  3. 3

    Departamento de Ecologia y Territorio, Pontifica Universidad Javeriana. Transv. 4 No. 42-00, piso 8, Bogotá, Colombia

  4. 4

    Université Paul Sabatier, CNRS, Laboratoire Evolution et Diversité Biologique UMR 5174, 31062 Toulouse, France

  5. 5

    Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle, Brunoy, France

  6. 6

    INRA, UMR “Ecologie des Forêts de Guyane”, 97387, Kourou Cedex, French Guiana

  7. 7

    Department of Biology, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611 USA

* Correspondence and present address: Institut für Evolutionsbiologie und Umweltwissenschaften, Universität Zürich, Winterthurerstrasse 190, CH-8057 Zürich, Switzerland. E-mail:timothy.paine@ieu.uzh.ch

Publication History

  1. Issue published online: 1 DEC 2011
  2. Article first published online: 18 OCT 2011
  3. Editor, Jessica Gurevitch Manuscript received 1 August 2011 First decision made 5 September 2011 Manuscript accepted 23 September 2011

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Keywords:

  • Community assembly;
  • density dependence;
  • French Guiana;
  • generalised linear mixed models;
  • Janzen–Connell hypothesis;
  • seedling recruitment;
  • species coexistence;
  • survival

Ecology Letters (2011) 14: 34–41

Abstract

Negative density dependence (NDD) and environmental filtering (EF) shape community assembly, but their relative importance is poorly understood. Recent studies have shown that seedling’s mortality risk is positively related to the phylogenetic relatedness of neighbours. However, natural enemies, whose depredations often cause NDD, respond to functional traits of hosts rather than phylogenetic relatedness per se. To understand the roles of NDD and EF in community assembly, we assessed the effects on seedling mortality of functional similarity, phylogenetic relatedness and stem density of neighbouring seedlings and adults in a species-rich tropical forest. Mortality risks increased for common species when their functional traits departed substantially from the neighbourhood mean, and for all species when surrounded by close relatives. This indicates that NDD affects community assembly more broadly than does EF, and leads to the tentative conclusion that natural enemies respond to phylogenetically correlated traits. Our results affirm the prominence of NDD in structuring species-rich communities.

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