Question: What changes occur as a consequence of the massive flowering and senescence of the dominant understory species of bamboo, Chusquea culeou (E. Desvaux)? In this study, we documented some of the ecological consequences of this rare event that occurred in 2001, the previous flowering having occurred more than 60 years ago. Location: Nothofagus temperate forest, Patagonia, Argentina. Methods: We assessed changes in environmental variables and bamboo biomass post‐flowering in an old‐growth southern beech forest. In addition, we monitored the demography of emergent Ch. culeou seedling and Nothofagus nervosa saplings, comparing non‐flowered (live understory) and flowered (senescent understory) patches within the forest matrix. Results: Bamboo flowering dramatically increased light availability in the forest understory but, surprisingly, other environmental changes were not observed. Bamboo seedlings emerged in both patch types, and experienced gradual but modest mortality through time. Bamboo dieback promoted higher survivorship and an increment in biomass, height, number of leaves and buds in the saplings of Nothofagus nervosa. Conclusion: The high density of bamboo seedlings 5 years after the flowering event and the independence of emergence from environmental variables suggest that understory regeneration is a gradual process that is not strongly regulated by initial seedling density or resource limitation. In contrast, microenvironmental conditions created after the flowering event significantly increased Nothofagus sapling growth and survival. These results suggest that overstory forest regeneration could be enhanced in this temperate forest in the first years after this infrequent bamboo flowering event.

Driven by the pressure of increasing forage production for cattle, dry forests and woodlands of Argentina are suffering one of the highest deforestation rates in the world. In this study we combined field work and a remote sensing approach to assess the successional trajectory in terms of functional group diversity and ecosystem phenology, following roller chopping deforestation in a woodland of central Argentina. The first year after disturbance, shrub cover decreased at the same proportion than grass cover increased while tree cover was drastically reduced. After 3 years, shrubs recovered 70% of the original cover and grasses maintained a relatively high proportion, but tree cover remained low. Roller-chopping favoured early over late successional species in the case of woody plants, but had the inverse effect in the case of grasses. At ecosystem scale the length of the growing season was drastically shortened by 100 days following disturbance. Roller chopping improves ecosystem services of provision by enhancing forage's offer but at the same time deteriorated the system by reducing functional plant diversity