Phenological patterns in monsoon rainforests in the Northern Territory, Australia

Bach, Christine S.

doi:10.1111/j.1442-9993.2002.tb00197.x

Cited by 5 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 46 publications

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“…This implies that germination of many woody taxa at seasonally dry sites is delayed until the start of the ensuing wet season period. Similar observations were made by Bach (2002) in her 3-year study of monsoon rain forest flowering and fruiting phenology at twelve moist (floristically analogous to PL) and four seasonally dry (floristically analogous to SL) sites in the Northern Territory, Australia. She found that while fruiting both at moist and seasonally dry sites was concentrated in the wet season, at seasonally dry sites fruiting tended to peak later than, and extend into, the dry season.…”

Section: Recruitment Processessupporting

confidence: 78%

“…Flowering peaks before the start of the wet season in rain forest at perennially moist sites, and with the onset of the wet at seasonally dry sites. Fruiting is concentrated in the wet season at moist sites and peaks later at seasonally dry lowland sites (Bach, 2002;this study). Fruiting in Allosyncarpia also occurs in the mid wet season (Russell-Smith, 1986;Fordyce, 1998).…”

Section: Flowering and Fruiting Phenologymentioning

confidence: 77%

“…For the purposes of this study only one replicate of each of the four floristic types was selected since: (1) previous replicated studies (all one-off surveys, or of relatively shortterm duration) had already established major patterning in forest typology (Russell-Smith, 1991), dormant seed banks (Russell-Smith & Lucas, 1994), sapling banks (Russell-Smith, 1996), seed rain phenology (Bach, 2002); (2) the prime focus of this study was to document the recruitment dynamics of canopy dominants characteristic of the respective forest types over a decadal period; (3) the four selected sites included diagnostic dominant tree species (Russell-Smith, 1991) characteristic of each of the respective four forest types (Table 1); and (4) the logistic realities of sampling isolated replicate àStructural terminology follows Webb (1959Webb ( , 1978. §Diagnostic dominant tree species for floristically defined rain forest groups as given in Russell-Smith (1991, Appendix 1), occurring also at respective study sites, where site PL equates with groups 1-2, PS with groups 3-7, SS with group 8, and SL with group 9.…”

Section: Study Sitesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Flowering and fruiting phenology is strongly seasonal in both monsoon rain forest and savanna dominants (Williams et al, 1999;Bach, 2002), although there are significant differences in timing of major phenological events. Flowering peaks before the start of the wet season in rain forest at perennially moist sites, and with the onset of the wet at seasonally dry sites.…”

Section: Flowering and Fruiting Phenologymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…By contrast with tropical forest systems in perhumid climates, it remains the case that very limited work has been reported on the regeneration pathways and dynamics of forest assemblages in the markedly seasonal tropics (Murphy & Lugo, 1986;Gerhardt & Hytteborn, 1992). Available observations suggest that: (1) fruiting phenological patterns exhibit substantial variability between different study sites (Bach, 2002); (2) seed banks are dominated by early successional species, as per rain forests occurring under more perhumid conditions (e.g. Garwood, 1989); (3) seedling recruitment occurs mostly in association with moist, rainy periods, and survivorship is affected markedly by seasonal moisture deficit conditions (Lieberman & Li, 1992); (4) many woody species exhibit the capacity to resprout following stem death (Murphy & Lugo, 1986;Bowman, 1991a;Russell-Smith & Stanton, 2002); and (5) clonal reproduction is likely to be more prevalent at seasonally dry sites (Ewel, 1977;Lieberman & Li, 1992;Russell-Smith, 1996).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Monsoon rain forest seedling dynamics, northern Australia: contrasts with regeneration in eucalypt‐dominated savannas

Russell‐Smith

Setterfield

2006

Journal of Biogeography

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Aim To explore: (1) the relative influences of site conditions, especially moisture relations, on pathways and rates of monsoon rain forest seedling and sapling regeneration, especially of canopy dominants, in northern Australia; and (2) contrasts between regeneration syndromes of dominant woody taxa in savannas and monsoon rain forest.Location Four monsoon rain forest sites, representative of regional major habitat and vegetation types, in Kakadu National Park, northern Australia.Methods A decadal study involved: (1) initial assessment over 2.5 years to explore within-year variability in seed rain, dormant seed banks and seedling (< 50 cm height) dynamics; and (2) thereafter, monitoring of seedling and sapling (50 cm height to 5 cm d.b.h.) dynamics undertaken annually in the late dry season. On the basis of observations from this and other studies, regeneration syndromes of dominant monsoon rain forest taxa are contrasted with comparable information for dominant woody savanna taxa, Eucalyptus and Corymbia especially.Results Key observations from the monsoon rain forest regeneration dynamics study component are that: (1) peak seed rain inputs of rain forest taxa were observed in the wet season at perennially moist sites, whereas inputs at seasonally dry sites extended into, or peaked in, the dry season; (2) dormant soil seed banks of woody rain forest taxa were dominated by pioneer taxa, especially figs; (3) longevity of dormant seed banks of woody monsoon rain forest taxa, including figs, was expended within 3 years; (4) seedling recruitment of monsoon rain forest woody taxa was derived mostly from wet season seed rain with limited inputs from soil seed banks; (5) at all sites rain forest seedling mortality occurred mostly in the dry season; (6) rain forest seedling and sapling densities were consistently greater at moist sites; (7) recruitment from clonal reproduction was negligible, even following unplanned low intensity fires.Main conclusions By comparison with dominant savanna eucalypts, dominant monsoon rain forest taxa recruit substantially greater stocks of seedlings, but exhibit slower aerial growth and development of resprouting capacity in early years, lack lignotubers in mesic species, and lack capacity for clonal reproduction. The reliance on sexual as opposed to vegetative reproduction places monsoon rain forest taxa at significant disadvantage, especially slower growing species on seasonally dry sites, given annual-biennial fires in many north Australian savannas.

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Section: Recruitment Processessupporting

confidence: 78%

Section: Flowering and Fruiting Phenologymentioning

confidence: 77%

Section: Study Sitesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Flowering and Fruiting Phenologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Monsoon rain forest seedling dynamics, northern Australia: contrasts with regeneration in eucalypt‐dominated savannas

Russell‐Smith

Setterfield

2006

Journal of Biogeography

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Assessing intraspecific phenological synchrony in zoochorous trees from the monsoon forests of northern Australia

Franklin

Bach

2006

J. Trop. Ecol.

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Intraspecific synchrony in the phenology of tropical forest trees has implications for satiation of browsers and seed predators, pollination, dispersal and interpreting plant responses to environmental cues and stresses. Community phenological studies have been constrained in their consideration of these issues by the lack of concise quantitative measures of intraspecific synchrony. We propose a novel application of Colwell's predictability indices to overcome this deficiency. Its application is demonstrated by evaluating the leaf and reproductive phenologies of 8–16 individuals of each of 20 monsoon forest tree species from northern Australia monthly for 30 mo. The indices yielded substantial additional information over that provided by summaries averaged amongst conspecifics. Marked intraspecific asynchronies in leaf flush or flowering occurred in five evergreen species and two deciduous fig species, and were associated with prolonged individual commitments to these states. Five partly deciduous species exhibited marked intraspecific variation in the seasonal extent of leaf loss. We interpret the observed variation in intraspecific synchrony in terms of contrasting water-use and pollination strategies. The synchronicity indices are concise and robust to small and variable sample sizes, and may thus enhance studies of species-rich assemblages.

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Tree phenology in montane forests of southern Ecuador can be explained by precipitation, radiation and photoperiodic control

et al. 2008

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Abstract:We investigated the effect of seasonality on tree phenology in the tropical montane rain forest of southern Ecuador and analysed possible triggering factors. Two hypotheses were tested: (1) Interspecific synchronization of flowering and fruiting phenology is higher at study sites with pronounced rainfall seasonality compared with sites within perhumid forests. (2) Proximate causes for flowering in closely situated seasonal and perhumid sites are either photoperiodicity or climatic factors. Two nearby study sites with contrasting precipitation patterns were selected at the same altitude east and west of the western Cordillera. Eighty trees from 13 species were observed over a 2.5-y period. Three species were common to both study sites. Phenological and climate data were collected and cross-correlated by conducting a time-series analysis. At the perhumid site, very clear annual patterns of phenological behaviour could be observed for most of the selected rain-forest tree species, but with a poor interspecific synchronization. On the nearby seasonal site in contrast, most species showed high synchrony in their phenological behaviour coinciding with the dry season. There is strong evidence that flowering is induced not by one factor alone: we identified photoperiodic control, radiation and precipitation as possible proximate causes for both sites. Our results confirm studies which state that these factors are closely linked to each other in the tropics.

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Phenological patterns in monsoon rainforests in the Northern Territory, Australia

Cited by 5 publications

References 46 publications

Monsoon rain forest seedling dynamics, northern Australia: contrasts with regeneration in eucalypt‐dominated savannas

Monsoon rain forest seedling dynamics, northern Australia: contrasts with regeneration in eucalypt‐dominated savannas

Assessing intraspecific phenological synchrony in zoochorous trees from the monsoon forests of northern Australia

Tree phenology in montane forests of southern Ecuador can be explained by precipitation, radiation and photoperiodic control

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