Can we predict carbon stocks in tropical ecosystems from tree diversity? Comparing species and functional diversity in a plantation and a natural forest

Abstract

Summary• Linking tree diversity to carbon storage can provide further motivation to conserve tropical forests and to design carbon-enriched plantations. Here, we examine the role of tree diversity and functional traits in determining carbon storage in a mixed-species plantation and in a natural tropical forest in Panama.• We used species richness, functional trait diversity, species dominance and functional trait dominance to predict tree carbon storage across these two forests. Then we compared the species ranking based on wood density, maximum diameter, maximum height, and leaf mass per area (LMA) between sites to reveal how these values changed between different forests.• Increased species richness, a higher proportion of nitrogen fixers and species with low LMA increased carbon storage in the mixed-species plantation, while a higher proportion of large trees and species with high LMA increased tree carbon storage in the natural forest. Furthermore, we found that tree species varied greatly in their absolute and relative values between study sites.• Different results in different forests mean that we cannot easily predict carbon storage capacity in natural forests using data from experimental plantations. Managers should be cautious when applying functional traits measured in natural populations in the design of carbon-enriched plantations.

Functional composition drives ecosystem function through multiple mechanisms in a broadleaved subtropical forest

“…Tree size inequality, which is related to tree species diversity, has been linked with increased biomass in boreal forests . Even so, it is far from clear that the NC-EF paradigm holds for all ecosystems and varying results have been found in forests (Reiss et al 2009;Paquette and Messier 2011;Ruiz-Jaen and Potvin 2011). While the previous work at our site suggested a positive relationship between tree species richness and EF (McEwan et al 2011a), taxonomic measures, such as species richness, do not account for the fact that some species may be functionally redundant (Loreau 2004).…”

Carbon and nitrogen stock and fluxes in coastal Atlantic Forest of southeast Brazil: potential impacts of climate change on biogeochemical functioning

“…Climate may also interfere with the litter decomposition process, a critical step in biogeochemistry cycling, which is responsible for the transference of nutrients from the litter layer to the poor surface soils of the tropics (Saiter et al, 2009) and carbon and nitrogen release from organic matter. Dry-season retardation of leaf-litter decomposition has been observed in moist (Luizão and Schubart, 1987) and dry tropical forests Villela and Proctor, 2002).…”

“…It is well known that biogeochemistry cycles are strongly related to rainfall in moist and seasonally dry tropical forests in the opposite manner (Saiter et al, 2009). …”

“…Based on the knowledge that specific environmental conditions, such as climate, soils, species composition and successional stage, drive nutrient cycling in tropical forests (Vitousek, 2004;Saiter et al, 2009), we will focus our analysis on how climate changes according to scenarios described by Marengo et al (2009), which may affect carbon and nitrogen of the coastal Atlantic Forest. In this context, it is also important to remember that biodiversity of this area can also be severely affected by climate changes (Loiselle et al, 2010).…”

A Review of Strong Evidence for the Effect of Functional Dominance on Carbon Stocks in Natural Forest Ecosystems

“…In some studies, the species or functional groups have been experimentally removed from initially homogeneous woody communities in the field (Aguiar and Sala, 1994;Diaz et al, 2003;Bret-Harte et al, 2008;Wardle et al, 2008;Urcelay et al, 2009). Further, many studies have been independently tested the effects of different components of FTD, particularly CWM and FD effects, in natural forests and also assessed the trait-specific relationships with C stocks in natural forest ecosystems (Caspersen and Pacala, 2001;Delagrange et al, 2008;Jonsson and Wardle, 2010;Ruiz-Jaen and Potvin, 2011;Wardle et al, 2012). However, empirical studies focusing on the comparison of CWM (the mass ratio hypothesis) and FD (the niche complementarity) effects on C stocks in the naturally established forest ecosystems are still very scarce (Conti and Diaz, 2013;Cavanaugh et al, 2014;Finegan et al, 2015).…”