Contrasting effects of defaunation on aboveground carbon storage across the global tropics

Anand M. Osuri; Jayashree Ratnam; Varun Varma; Patricia Alvarez-Loayza; Johanna Hurtado Astaiza; Matt Bradford; Christine Fletcher; Mireille Ndoundou-Hockemba; Patrick A. Jansen; David Kenfack; Andrew R. Marshall; B. R. Ramesh; Francesco Rovero; Mahesh Sankaran

doi:10.1038/ncomms11351

Contrasting effects of defaunation on aboveground carbon storage across the global tropics

Anand M. Osuri^*, Jayashree Ratnam, Varun Varma, Patricia Alvarez-Loayza, Johanna Hurtado Astaiza, Matt Bradford, Christine Fletcher, Mireille Ndoundou-Hockemba, Patrick A. Jansen, David Kenfack, Andrew R. Marshall, B. R. Ramesh, Francesco Rovero, Mahesh Sankaran

^*Corresponding author for this work

Environment and Geography

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

Defaunation is causing declines of large-seeded animal-dispersed trees in tropical forests worldwide, but whether and how these declines will affect carbon storage across this biome is unclear. Here we show, using a pan-tropical data set, that simulated declines of large-seeded animal-dispersed trees have contrasting effects on aboveground carbon stocks across Earth's tropical forests. In our simulations, African, American and South Asian forests, which have high proportions of animal-dispersed species, consistently show carbon losses (2-12%), but Southeast Asian and Australian forests, where there are more abiotically dispersed species, show little to no carbon losses or marginal gains (±1%). These patterns result primarily from changes in wood volume, and are underlain by consistent relationships in our empirical data (B2,100 species), wherein, large-seeded animal-dispersed species are larger as adults than small-seeded animal-dispersed species, but are smaller than abiotically dispersed species. Thus, floristic differences and distinct dispersal mode-seed size-adult size combinations can drive contrasting regional responses to defaunation.

Original language	English
Article number	11351
Number of pages	7
Journal	Nature Communications
Volume	7
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms11351
Publication status	Published - 25 Apr 2016

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Osuri, A. M., Ratnam, J., Varma, V., Alvarez-Loayza, P., Astaiza, J. H., Bradford, M., Fletcher, C., Ndoundou-Hockemba, M., Jansen, P. A., Kenfack, D., Marshall, A. R., Ramesh, B. R., Rovero, F., & Sankaran, M. (2016). Contrasting effects of defaunation on aboveground carbon storage across the global tropics. Nature Communications, 7, Article 11351. https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms11351

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title = "Contrasting effects of defaunation on aboveground carbon storage across the global tropics",

abstract = "Defaunation is causing declines of large-seeded animal-dispersed trees in tropical forests worldwide, but whether and how these declines will affect carbon storage across this biome is unclear. Here we show, using a pan-tropical data set, that simulated declines of large-seeded animal-dispersed trees have contrasting effects on aboveground carbon stocks across Earth's tropical forests. In our simulations, African, American and South Asian forests, which have high proportions of animal-dispersed species, consistently show carbon losses (2-12%), but Southeast Asian and Australian forests, where there are more abiotically dispersed species, show little to no carbon losses or marginal gains (±1%). These patterns result primarily from changes in wood volume, and are underlain by consistent relationships in our empirical data (B2,100 species), wherein, large-seeded animal-dispersed species are larger as adults than small-seeded animal-dispersed species, but are smaller than abiotically dispersed species. Thus, floristic differences and distinct dispersal mode-seed size-adult size combinations can drive contrasting regional responses to defaunation.",

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AU - Astaiza, Johanna Hurtado

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AU - Fletcher, Christine

AU - Ndoundou-Hockemba, Mireille

AU - Jansen, Patrick A.

AU - Kenfack, David

AU - Marshall, Andrew R.

AU - Ramesh, B. R.

AU - Rovero, Francesco

AU - Sankaran, Mahesh

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N2 - Defaunation is causing declines of large-seeded animal-dispersed trees in tropical forests worldwide, but whether and how these declines will affect carbon storage across this biome is unclear. Here we show, using a pan-tropical data set, that simulated declines of large-seeded animal-dispersed trees have contrasting effects on aboveground carbon stocks across Earth's tropical forests. In our simulations, African, American and South Asian forests, which have high proportions of animal-dispersed species, consistently show carbon losses (2-12%), but Southeast Asian and Australian forests, where there are more abiotically dispersed species, show little to no carbon losses or marginal gains (±1%). These patterns result primarily from changes in wood volume, and are underlain by consistent relationships in our empirical data (B2,100 species), wherein, large-seeded animal-dispersed species are larger as adults than small-seeded animal-dispersed species, but are smaller than abiotically dispersed species. Thus, floristic differences and distinct dispersal mode-seed size-adult size combinations can drive contrasting regional responses to defaunation.

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Contrasting effects of defaunation on aboveground carbon storage across the global tropics

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