Moisture and Temperature Patterns of Canopy Humus and Forest Floor Soil of a Montane Cloud Forest, Costa Rica

Bohlman, Stephanie A.; Matelson, Teri J.; Nadkarni, Nalini M.

doi:10.2307/2388898

Cited by 98 publications

(64 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…These microhabitats provide habitat more similar to a large established, and in the present context, species rich epiphyte clumps, where moisture and temperature fluctuations are lower (Freiberg, 2001;Stuntz et al, 2002), and nutrient availability is higher (Bohlman et al, 1995;Ingram and Nadkarni, 1993) relative to uncolonised branches or thin humus deposits. In fact, the larger bromeliads slowly leak water withheld in their tanks for long periods after rain and the humus surrounding the attachments may be completely saturated whilst all other deposits are dry (pers.…”

Section: Bromeliad Microhabitatsmentioning

confidence: 65%

“…These ameliorating effects are the result of the water retention by the epiphytic accumulations. Epiphytic accumulations, and some of the plants themselves (tank bromeliads), suspend large quantities of water in the canopy for long periods after rain and mist events (Bohlman et al, 1995;Kurschner and Parolly, 1998b;Richardson et al, 2000;Veneklaas et al, 1990;Zotz and Thomas, 1999). During the day, evaporation of this moisture reduces temperature, whilst at night, the heat capacity of water reduces radiative cooling.…”

Section: Modification Of Microclimate By Epiphytesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Epiphytic bryophytes and habitat variation in montane rainforest, Peru

Romanski¹,

Pharo

Kirkpatrick³

2011

The Bryologist

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A total of 190 holoepiphytic and 5 hemiepiphytic vascular plant species were collected from the canopy and the trunk of an emergent Ficus L. species host that is common to a Peruvian cloud forest. One hundred and fourteen of the vascular epiphyte species were orchids. A large majority of the vascular species were rare in occurrence. Vascular epiphyte diversity and density was highest in the outer canopy zone of the host crown. In the inner canopy zone there was a dearth of epiphytes, attributed to a high rate of epiphyte slumping on the smooth-barked branches. The trunk had a different suit of species to those found in the canopy.During the wet season, the thickening of epiphytic matter in the outer canopy zone appeared to contribute to a large amelioration of daytime and nocturnal temperatures through evaporation and heat retention respectively.Nocturnal temperatures were highest in the outer canopy zone, and were lowest on the forest floor. The latter was attributed to the downward flow of the product of radiative cooling as a result of the heterogeneous canopy on the steep slope.Epiphyte clumps appear to slump before competition causes the loss of early successional species. Some species showed a preference for more shaded epiphyte clumps and many were more frequent on smaller branch diameters. Most species showed a moderately high niche overlap with a large number of other species, which suggested a high degree of species coexistence.Epiphyte slumping is suggested to be the major driving mechanism for the maintenance of non-equilibrium in the community. Aspects of the phenologies of epiphytes, age-structure of the community and high environmental variation could be other mechanisms for the maintenance of a high degree of species coexistence.iii

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Section: Bromeliad Microhabitatsmentioning

confidence: 65%

Section: Modification Of Microclimate By Epiphytesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Epiphytic bryophytes and habitat variation in montane rainforest, Peru

Romanski¹,

Pharo

Kirkpatrick³

2011

The Bryologist

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“…These models indicate that larger frogs are substantially more resistant to evaporative water loss [9], which is an increasing problem in the warmer and drier upper forest strata [32] as well as at lower elevations (see the electronic supplementary material, figure S4a-c).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Increasing arboreality with altitude: a novel biogeographic dimension

et al. 2013

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Biodiversity is spatially organized by climatic gradients across elevation and latitude. But do other gradients exist that might drive biogeographic patterns? Here, we show that rainforest's vertical strata provide climatic gradients much steeper than those offered by elevation and latitude, and biodiversity of arboreal species is organized along this gradient. In Philippine and Singaporean rainforests, we demonstrate that rainforest frogs tend to shift up in the rainforest strata as altitude increases. Moreover, a Philippine-wide dataset of frog distributions shows that frog assemblages become increasingly arboreal at higher elevations. Thus, increased arboreality with elevation at broad biogeographic scales mirrors patterns we observed at local scales. Our proposed 'arboreality hypothesis' suggests that the ability to exploit arboreal habitats confers the potential for larger geographical distributions because species can shift their location in the rainforest strata to compensate for shifts in temperature associated with elevation and latitude. This novel finding may help explain patterns of species richness and abundance wherever vegetation produces a vertical microclimatic gradient. Our results further suggest that global warming will 'flatten' the biodiversity in rainforests by pushing arboreal species towards the cooler and wetter ground. This 'flattening' could potentially have serious impacts on forest functioning and species survival.

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“…In certain forests, epiphytes comprise up to 63% of the photosynthetic biomass (Walker & Ataroff 2002) and 45% of the mineral content (Nadkarni, 1984). Additionally, epiphytes can intercept and accumulate substantial quantities of dead organic material, a rich source of nutrients for fauna and vegetation existing above the ground, influence water dynamics and the microclimate (Pócs 1980, Hofstede et al 1993Bohlman et al 1995, Freiberg & Freiberg 2000. Epiphytes play an important role in the primary productivity and nutrient cycling within ecosystems, contributing significant quantities of biomass.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Edge effect on vascular epiphytes in a subtropical Atlantic Forest

Bianchi

Kersten

2014

Acta Bot. Bras.

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Forest fragmentation affects biological communities by reducing habitat and increasing edges, thus reducing the effective size of the habitable zones. The subtropical atlantic Araucaria forest, typical on the southern Brazil, in some regions has been reduced to less than 1% of its original size lasting only in small isolated fragments. This study aimed to analyse the impact the edge has on vascular epiphyte ensemble in a remnant of Araucaria forest. We surveyed 40 host trees in four transects: one at the edge; and three at 15, 30 and 60 m from the edge. On each host tree we estimated the epiphyte biomass, using four size classes. We compared the transects using Jackknife estimator of absolute species number, diversity indices, non-metric multi-dimensional scaling and multi-response permutation procedure analysis. We recorded 85 epiphytes species. Absolute species richness and diversity were lower at the edge and higher at 60 m in from the edge. Shannon's evenness did not differ significantly among transects and Simpson's evenness values were inconsistent. The vascular epiphyte community under study was significantly altered by the edge.

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Moisture and Temperature Patterns of Canopy Humus and Forest Floor Soil of a Montane Cloud Forest, Costa Rica

Cited by 98 publications

References 22 publications

Epiphytic bryophytes and habitat variation in montane rainforest, Peru

Epiphytic bryophytes and habitat variation in montane rainforest, Peru

Increasing arboreality with altitude: a novel biogeographic dimension

Edge effect on vascular epiphytes in a subtropical Atlantic Forest

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