Seed production and predation in a changing climate: new roles for resource and seed predator feedback?

Solbreck, Christer; Knape, Jonas

doi:10.1002/ecy.1941

Cited by 18 publications

(22 citation statements)

References 50 publications

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“…The decadal changes in masting behaviour may provoke various changes in the forest ecosystem. Solbreck and Knape () showed that highly fluctuating biennial seed production can lead to predator satiation. However, biennial seed production in Q. crispula may reduce predator satiation.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Decadal changes in masting behaviour of oak trees with rising temperature

et al. 2020

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Decadal changes in masting behaviour—directional changes in seed production with fluctuations on a decadal time‐scale—are attracting widespread attention in the context of global climate change. However, our mechanistic understanding of the effects of climate on seed production on a decadal scale is unsatisfactory, partly because of the insufficient statistical analyses of long‐term data on masting. We detected decadal changes in masting behaviour in the Japanese oak Quercus crispula based on long‐term data (38 years: 1980–2017) from the Kitakami Mountains of Japan. The moving average of seed production in a 20‐year sliding window increased, whereas the coefficient of variation decreased. A wavelet power spectrum, as well as a second‐order log‐linear autoregressive (AR) model showed that masting intervals shortened from 3‐ or 4‐year cycle to a 2‐year cycle. The moving average of seed production increased linearly as the moving average of temperature increased. Temporal variations of the two AR model coefficients as a function of temperature were well described by concave curves. Synthesis. By conducting the statistical analyses of a long‐term seed production dataset, we obtained significant evidence of decadal changes in the masting behaviour of the Japanese oak and showed that the shortening of the masting interval was associated with rising temperature. A resource allocation shift and an environmental veto were discussed as possible mechanisms underlying the decadal change.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Decadal changes in masting behaviour of oak trees with rising temperature

et al. 2020

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“…The finding here of a long-term effect of climate on plant birth rate is extremely rare, as very few investigators have examined seed production over such long periods (reviewed in ref. 15). Impacts of climate change on demography have been far more commonly studied in animal populations (reviewed in ref.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…14). In contrast, for herbaceous species that lend themselves more easily to studies of seed limitation (14), studies of trends in fecundity that last longer than 10 y are extremely rare (15), especially in comparison with the large literature on masting trees (16). Only one study of which I am aware has combined these two types of information (17).…”

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confidence: 99%

Early snowmelt projected to cause population decline in a subalpine plant

Campbell

2019

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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How climate change influences the dynamics of plant populations is not well understood, as few plant studies have measured responses of vital rates to climatic variables and modeled the impact on population growth. The present study used 25 y of demographic data to analyze how survival, growth, and fecundity respond to date of spring snowmelt for a subalpine plant. Fecundity was estimated by seed production (over 15 y) and also divided into flower number, fruit set, seeds per fruit, and escape from seed predation. Despite no apparent effects on flower number, plants produced more seeds in years with later snowmelt. Survival and probability of flowering were reduced by early snowmelt in the previous year. Based on demographic models, earlier snowmelt with warming is expected to lead to negative population growth, driven especially by changes in seedling establishment and seed production. These results provide a rare example of how climate change is expected to influence the dynamics of a plant population. They furthermore illustrate the potential for strong population impacts even in the absence of more commonly reported visual signs, such as earlier blooming or reduced floral display in early melting years.climate change | fecundity | population dynamics | seed production | snowmelt A critical challenge in predicting the biological impacts of climate change is to understand how the new environmental conditions will influence decline or growth of a population. Climate change has reduced the extent of snow cover in the Northern Hemisphere since the mid-20th century (e.g., by 11.7% per decade in June) and is projected to further reduce it as the average global temperature rises (1). In mountainous areas of the western United States, the snowpack water equivalent has declined (2), and, in at least some of those regions, the average date of snowmelt in the spring has advanced (3). That earlier snowmelt has been associated with shifts to earlier phenology in a large number of species, including blooming times in flowering plants (4-6). Whereas phenological shifts of plants in response to climate change are well documented (7), rarely is the impact of the phenological shift on reproduction known (8,9). In general, few studies examine associations of climatic variables with the demography of individual plant populations. However, it is ultimately through changes in demographic vital rates that a population will persist or not in the face of environmental change.An understanding of how climate influences plant demography can be separated into two problems: (i) how climate influences a vital rate and (ii) how that vital rate influences population growth. Studies of the climate sensitivity for any vital rate are relatively rare for plant populations (10), but that gap is most striking for the rate of reproduction through seed production, as reproduction is the vital rate that would be impacted by a shift in blooming time. Studies of how climate influences seed production have often focused on long-lived tree species, especi...

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“…However, the scientific knowledge about the positive and negative effects of spontaneous dispersal is far from complete (Arruda et al ). Recovery of vegetation via spontaneous dispersal is a complicated process and depends on multitude of factors such as composition of the species pool, landscape structure and connectivity, land use history, dispersal ability of species, availability and behavior of dispersal vectors as well as on aspects related to seed production and predation (Marteinsdóttir ; Johanidesová et al ; Prach et al ; Solbreck & Knape ; Arruda et al ; Schwab et al ). The capacity to incorporate all the aspects in practical restoration is hindered both by the lack of standardization in approaches and methods, as well as by the lack of basic knowledge of the processes.…”

Section: Success Of Spontaneous Dispersal and Colonizationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Beyond the species pool: modification of species dispersal, establishment, and assembly by habitat restoration

Török¹,

Helm

Kiehl

et al. 2018

Restoration Ecology

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Species dispersal, establishment, and assembly are crucial stages of the life history of plants, and clear understanding of the governing forces and rules that shape species composition in a particular community is vital for successful ecological restoration. In this article, we focus on five aspects of seed dispersal and plant establishment, which should be considered during habitat restoration actions. In the first two sections, we discuss the success of spontaneous dispersal and establishment on restoration based on either spatial dispersal or local seed banks. In the third section, we assess the possibilities of species introduction and assisted dispersal. In the fourth section, we introduce some possibilities for the improvement of establishment success of spontaneously dispersed or introduced species. Finally, we highlight issues influencing long‐term persistence and sustainability of restored habitats, related to the alteration of management type and intensity, climate change, and spread of non‐native species. With the present article, we introduce the special issue entitled “Seed dispersal and soil seed banks – promising sources for ecological restoration” containing 15 papers by 62 authors from 10 countries arranged in the abovementioned five topics.

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Seed production and predation in a changing climate: new roles for resource and seed predator feedback?

Cited by 18 publications

References 50 publications

Decadal changes in masting behaviour of oak trees with rising temperature

Decadal changes in masting behaviour of oak trees with rising temperature

Early snowmelt projected to cause population decline in a subalpine plant

Beyond the species pool: modification of species dispersal, establishment, and assembly by habitat restoration

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