Drivers of beta diversity along a precipitation gradient in tropical forests of the Cauca River Canyon in Colombia

Abstract

Climatic variation is one of the main factors that shape the structure and composition of plant communities on earth. For data set plants, both the total amount of water and its pattern of seasonality play a key role in determining the main biomes around the world (Stephenson, 1990;Whittaker, 1975). In lowland tropical forests, humidity ranges from dry areas, where evapotranspiration exceeds precipitation for at least three to four consecutive months, to wet areas, where this period extends from zero to two months (Holdridge, 1967). Toward the dry