1
|
Dossa GGO, Li HL, Pan B, Ling TC, Schaefer DA, Roeder M, Njoroge DM, Zuo J, Song L, Ofosu-Bamfo B, Schnitzer SA, Harrison RD, Bongers F, Zhang JL, Cao KF, Powers JS, Fan ZX, Chen YJ, Corlett RT, Zotz G, Oleksyn J, Wyka TP, Codjia JEI, Cornelissen JHC. Effects of lianas on forest biogeochemistry during their lives and afterlives. GLOBAL CHANGE BIOLOGY 2024; 30:e17274. [PMID: 38605677 DOI: 10.1111/gcb.17274] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/21/2023] [Revised: 03/02/2024] [Accepted: 03/12/2024] [Indexed: 04/13/2024]
Abstract
Climate change and other anthropogenic disturbances are increasing liana abundance and biomass in many tropical and subtropical forests. While the effects of living lianas on species diversity, ecosystem carbon, and nutrient dynamics are receiving increasing attention, the role of dead lianas in forest ecosystems has been little studied and is poorly understood. Trees and lianas coexist as the major woody components of forests worldwide, but they have very different ecological strategies, with lianas relying on trees for mechanical support. Consequently, trees and lianas have evolved highly divergent stem, leaf, and root traits. Here we show that this trait divergence is likely to persist after death, into the afterlives of these organs, leading to divergent effects on forest biogeochemistry. We introduce a conceptual framework combining horizontal, vertical, and time dimensions for the effects of liana proliferation and liana tissue decomposition on ecosystem carbon and nutrient cycling. We propose a series of empirical studies comparing traits between lianas and trees to answer questions concerning the influence of trait afterlives on the decomposability of liana and tree organs. Such studies will increase our understanding of the contribution of lianas to terrestrial biogeochemical cycling, and help predict the effects of their increasing abundance.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Gbadamassi G O Dossa
- CAS Key Laboratory of Tropical Forest Ecology, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Menglun, Mengla, Yunnan, China
| | - Hong-Lin Li
- CAS Key Laboratory of Tropical Forest Ecology, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Menglun, Mengla, Yunnan, China
- College of Biological and Chemical Science, Puer University, Puer, Yunnan, China
| | - Bo Pan
- Center for Integrative Conservation, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Menglun, Yunnan, China
| | - Tial C Ling
- CAS Key Laboratory of Tropical Forest Ecology, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Menglun, Mengla, Yunnan, China
| | - Douglas A Schaefer
- Centre for Mountain Futures, Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Science, Kunming, Yunnan, China
| | - Mareike Roeder
- Center for Integrative Conservation, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Menglun, Yunnan, China
- Department of Wetland Ecology, Institute of Geography and Geoecology, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology - KIT, Rastatt, Germany
| | - Denis M Njoroge
- CAS Key Laboratory of Tropical Forest Ecology, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Menglun, Mengla, Yunnan, China
- CAS Key Laboratory of Aquatic and Watershed Ecology, Wuhan Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan, China
| | - Juan Zuo
- CAS Key Laboratory of Aquatic and Watershed Ecology, Wuhan Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan, China
| | - Liang Song
- CAS Key Laboratory of Tropical Forest Ecology, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Menglun, Mengla, Yunnan, China
| | - Bismark Ofosu-Bamfo
- Department of Biological Science, University of Energy and Natural Resources, Sunyani, Ghana
- Department of Theoretical and Applied Biology, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana
| | - Stefan A Schnitzer
- Department of Biological Sciences, Marquette University, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA
| | | | - Frans Bongers
- Forest Ecology and Forest Management Group, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, The Netherlands
| | - Jiao-Lin Zhang
- CAS Key Laboratory of Tropical Forest Ecology, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Menglun, Mengla, Yunnan, China
| | - Kun-Fang Cao
- Ecophysiology and Evolution Group, State Key Laboratory for Conservation and Utilization of Subtropical Agro-Bioresources, Guangxi Key Laboratory of Forest Ecology and Conservation, and College of Forestry, Guangxi University, Nanning, China
| | - Jennifer S Powers
- Department of Plant and Microbial Biology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA
| | - Ze-Xin Fan
- CAS Key Laboratory of Tropical Forest Ecology, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Menglun, Mengla, Yunnan, China
| | - Ya-Jun Chen
- CAS Key Laboratory of Tropical Forest Ecology, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Menglun, Mengla, Yunnan, China
| | - Richard T Corlett
- Center for Integrative Conservation, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Menglun, Yunnan, China
| | - Gerhard Zotz
- Functional Ecology of Plants, Carl von Ossietzky University, Oldenburg, Germany
- Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Panama, Republic of Panama
| | - Jacek Oleksyn
- Polish Academy of Sciences, Institute of Dendrology, Kórnik, Poland
| | - Tomasz P Wyka
- General Botany Laboratory, Faculty of Biology, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznań, Poland
| | - Jean Evans Israel Codjia
- CAS Key Laboratory of Tropical Forest Ecology, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Menglun, Mengla, Yunnan, China
- Research Unit Tropical Mycology and Plants-Soil Fungi Interactions, Faculty of Agronomy, University of Parakou, Parakou, BP, Benin
| | - Johannes H C Cornelissen
- Systems Ecology, Amsterdam Institute for Life and Environment (A-LIFE), Faculty of Science, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
| |
Collapse
|
2
|
Ngute ASK, Schoeman DS, Pfeifer M, van der Heijden GMF, Phillips OL, van Breugel M, Campbell MJ, Chandler CJ, Enquist BJ, Gallagher RV, Gehring C, Hall JS, Laurance S, Laurance WF, Letcher SG, Liu W, Sullivan MJP, Wright SJ, Yuan C, Marshall AR. Global dominance of lianas over trees is driven by forest disturbance, climate and topography. GLOBAL CHANGE BIOLOGY 2024; 30:e17140. [PMID: 38273497 DOI: 10.1111/gcb.17140] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/15/2023] [Revised: 12/18/2023] [Accepted: 12/19/2023] [Indexed: 01/27/2024]
Abstract
Growing evidence suggests that liana competition with trees is threatening the global carbon sink by slowing the recovery of forests following disturbance. A recent theory based on local and regional evidence further proposes that the competitive success of lianas over trees is driven by interactions between forest disturbance and climate. We present the first global assessment of liana-tree relative performance in response to forest disturbance and climate drivers. Using an unprecedented dataset, we analysed 651 vegetation samples representing 26,538 lianas and 82,802 trees from 556 unique locations worldwide, derived from 83 publications. Results show that lianas perform better relative to trees (increasing liana-to-tree ratio) when forests are disturbed, under warmer temperatures and lower precipitation and towards the tropical lowlands. We also found that lianas can be a critical factor hindering forest recovery in disturbed forests experiencing liana-favourable climates, as chronosequence data show that high competitive success of lianas over trees can persist for decades following disturbances, especially when the annual mean temperature exceeds 27.8°C, precipitation is less than 1614 mm and climatic water deficit is more than 829 mm. These findings reveal that degraded tropical forests with environmental conditions favouring lianas are disproportionately more vulnerable to liana dominance and thus can potentially stall succession, with important implications for the global carbon sink, and hence should be the highest priority to consider for restoration management.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Alain Senghor K Ngute
- Forest Research Institute, University of the Sunshine Coast, Sippy Downs, Queensland, Australia
| | - David S Schoeman
- Ocean Futures Research Cluster, School of Science, Technology and Engineering, University of the Sunshine Coast, Sippy Downs, Queensland, Australia
- Centre for African Conservation Ecology, Department of Zoology, Nelson Mandela University, Gqeberha, South Africa
| | - Marion Pfeifer
- School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK
| | | | | | - Michiel van Breugel
- Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Balboa, Panama
- Department of Geography, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore
| | - Mason J Campbell
- Centre for Tropical Environmental and Sustainability Science, College of Science and Engineering, James Cook University, Cairns, Queensland, Australia
| | | | - Brian J Enquist
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, USA
| | - Rachael V Gallagher
- Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment, Western Sydney University, Penrith, New South Wales, Australia
| | - Christoph Gehring
- Post-Graduate Program in Agroecology, Maranhão State University, Cd. Universitária Paulo VI, São Luis, Brazil
| | | | - Susan Laurance
- Centre for Tropical Environmental and Sustainability Science, College of Science and Engineering, James Cook University, Cairns, Queensland, Australia
| | - William F Laurance
- Centre for Tropical Environmental and Sustainability Science, College of Science and Engineering, James Cook University, Cairns, Queensland, Australia
| | - Susan G Letcher
- Department of Plant Biology, College of the Atlantic, Bar Harbor, Maine, USA
| | - Wenyao Liu
- CAS Key Laboratory of Tropical Forest Ecology, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
| | - Martin J P Sullivan
- Department of Natural Sciences, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK
| | | | - Chunming Yuan
- Yunnan Academy of Forestry and Grassland, Kunming, Yunnan, China
| | - Andrew R Marshall
- Forest Research Institute, University of the Sunshine Coast, Sippy Downs, Queensland, Australia
| |
Collapse
|