Skip to content
Home
About Us
Resources
Profiles Metrics
Authors Directory
Institutions Directory
Top Authors
Top Institutions
Top Sponsors
AI Digest
Contact Us
Menu
Home
About Us
Resources
Profiles Metrics
Authors Directory
Institutions Directory
Top Authors
Top Institutions
Top Sponsors
AI Digest
Contact Us
Home
About Us
Resources
Profiles Metrics
Authors Directory
Institutions Directory
Top Authors
Top Institutions
Top Sponsors
AI Digest
Contact Us
Menu
Home
About Us
Resources
Profiles Metrics
Authors Directory
Institutions Directory
Top Authors
Top Institutions
Top Sponsors
AI Digest
Contact Us
Publication Details
AFRICAN RESEARCH NEXUS
SHINING A SPOTLIGHT ON AFRICAN RESEARCH
agricultural and biological sciences
Soil resources and topography shape local tree community structure in tropical forests
Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, Volume 280, No. 1753, Article 20122532, Year 2013
Notification
URL copied to clipboard!
Description
Both habitat filtering and dispersal limitation influence the compositional structure of forest communities, but previous studies examining the relative contributions of these processes with variation partitioning have primarily used topography to represent the influence of the environment. Here, we bring together data on both topography and soil resource variation within eight large (24-50 ha) tropical forest plots, and use variation partitioning to decompose community compositional variation into fractions explained by spatial, soil resource and topographic variables. Both soil resources and topography account for significant and approximately equal variation in tree community composition (9-34% and 5-29%, respectively), and all environmental variables together explain 13-39% of compositional variation within a plot. A large fraction of variation (19-37%) was spatially structured, yet unexplained by the environment, suggesting an important role for dispersal processes and unmeasured environmental variables. For the majority of sites, adding soil resource variables to topography nearly doubled the inferred role of habitat filtering, accounting for variation in compositional structure that would previously have been attributable to dispersal. Our results, illustrated using a new graphical depiction of community structure within these plots, demonstrate the importance of small-scale environmental variation in shaping local community structure in diverse tropical forests around the globe. © 2012 The Author(s) Published by the Royal Society. All rights reserved.
Authors & Co-Authors
Baldeck, Claire A.
United States, Urbana
Program in Ecology
United States, Urbana
University of Illinois Urbana-champaign
Harms, Kyle E.
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
United States, Baton Rouge
Louisiana State University
Yavitt, Joseph B.
United States, Ithaca
Cornell University
John, Robert
India, Mohanpur
Bidhan Chandra Krishi Viswavidyalaya
Turner, Benjamin L.
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Valencia, Renato L.
Ecuador, Quito
Pontificia Universidad Católica Del Ecuador
Navarrete, Hugo
Ecuador, Quito
Pontificia Universidad Católica Del Ecuador
Davies, Stuart James
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
United States, Cambridge
Harvard University
Chuyong, George Bindeh
Cameroon, Buea
University of Buea
Kenfack, David
United States, Cambridge
Harvard University
Thomas, Duncan W.
United States, Corvallis
Oregon State University
Madawala, Sumedha
Sri Lanka, Peradeniya
University of Peradeniya
Gunatilleke, Nimal I.A.U.
Sri Lanka, Peradeniya
University of Peradeniya
Gunatilleke, Savitri C.V.
Sri Lanka, Peradeniya
University of Peradeniya
Bunyavejchewin, Sarayudh
Thailand, Bangkok
National Park, Wildlife and Plant Conservation Department, Thailand
Kiratiprayoon, Somboon
Thailand, Pathum Thani
Thammasat University
Yaacob, Adzmi Bin
Malaysia, Shah Alam
Universiti Teknologi Mara
Nur Supardi, Mohd Noor
Malaysia, Kepong
Institut Penyelidikan Perhutanan Malaysia
Dalling, James William
United States, Urbana
University of Illinois Urbana-champaign
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Statistics
Citations: 246
Authors: 19
Affiliations: 15
Identifiers
Doi:
10.1098/rspb.2012.2532
ISSN:
09628452
e-ISSN:
14712954