Differential Effects of Hunting on Pre‐Dispersal Seed Predation and Primary and Secondary Seed Removal of Two Neotropical Tree Species

By N. Beckman, H. Muller‐Landau. 2007

92 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Many of the mammals undergoing drastic declines in tropical forests worldwide are important seed dispersers and seed predators, and thus changes in mammal communities due to hunting will affect plant recruitment. It has been hypothesized that larger‐seeded species will suffer greater reductions in seed removal and thus greater increases in predispersal seed predation than smaller‐seeded species. We compared primary and secondary seed removal and predispersal seed predation of two tree species between hunted and nonhunted sites in Central Panama. Seeds of Oenocarpus mapora (Arecaceae) are 16‐times greater in size than those of Cordia bicolor (Boraginaceae). We quantified primary seed removal and predispersal seed predation using seed traps, and we assessed secondary seed removal using seed removal plots. Primary removal of C. bicolor was 43 percent lower in the hunted sites, while primary removal of O. mapora was not significantly different. Secondary removal of unprotected O. mapora seeds on the ground was 59 percent lower in hunted sites, while secondary removal of C. bicolor was not significantly different. Predispersal seed predation of O. mapora by mammals was significantly lower in hunted sites, while predispersal seed predation by insects was not significantly different in either species. In combination with other studies, our results suggest that seed size is not a reliable predictor of the impacts of hunting. Mammal defaunation differentially affects stages and modes of seed dispersal and seed predation of different plant species, suggesting that these influences are complex and related to multiple plant traits.

Subfields: Ecology, Nature and Landscape Conservation

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/580501d0d8731bb173441da14a1b4eba3fb0bc0c

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Citations in the corpus

The Plight of Large Animals in Tropical Forests and the Consequences for Plant Regeneration (2007, background): “Beckman and Muller-Landau (2007) provide the first evaluation of the impact of hunting on predispersal seed predation.”
Emptying the Forest: Hunting and the Extirpation of Wildlife from Tropical Nature Reserves (2011, background): “…have shown that hunting can drastically alter several other important ecological processes, including seed predation (Roldán and Simonetti 2001, Beckman and Muller-Landau 2007, Dirzo et al. 2007, Wright et al. 2007b), seedling mortality (Roldán and Simonetti 2001, Nuñez-Iturri et al. 2008),…”
Bushmeat and the Fate of Trees with Seeds Dispersed by Large Primates in a Lowland Rain Forest in Western Amazonia (2007, background): “In tropical forests where hunting depleted most of the frugivorous primates, seed removal and dispersal of dependent trees is reduced (Beckman & Muller-Landau 2007, Wang et al. 2007).”
The Bushmeat Harvest Alters Seedling Banks by Favoring Lianas, Large Seeds, and Seeds Dispersed by Bats, Birds, and Wind (2007, background): “…known to alter the spatial dynamics of seedling recruitment by removing seed dispersal agents and seed predators for selected plant species in tropical forests (Wright et al. 2000, Roldán & Simonetti 2001, Wright & Duber 2001, Galetti et al. 2006, Beckman & Muller-Landau 2007, Wang et al. 2007).”
Hunting of Mammals Reduces Seed Removal and Dispersal of the Afrotropical Tree Antrocaryon klaineanum (Anacardiaceae) (2007, background): “Beckman and Muller-Landau (2007) found a similar difference in seed removal of Oenocarpus mapora (Arecaceae) seeds in hunted and unhunted sites in central Panama, and they used an experimental approach to demonstrate that this difference was due to both predation and dispersal.”
Predicting the Long‐Term Effects of Hunting on Plant Species Composition and Diversity in Tropical Forests (2007, background): “In the smaller-seeded (but still relatively largeseeded) palm Oenocarpus mapora, escape of predispersal vertebrate seed predation is 25 percent higher in a moderately hunted than in an unhunted forest (Beckman & Muller-Landau 2007).”