Journal Article

Tree mode of death and mortality risk factors across Amazon forests

Serrano, Julio, Baraloto, Christopher, Bayona, Lily Rodriguez, Cayo, Jeanneth Villalobos, de Almeida Reis, Simone Matias, Castro, Wendeson, Dourdain, Aurélie, Aragão, Luiz E. O. C., Cardozo, Nallaret Davila, Vieira, Ima Célia Guimarães, Stropp, Juliana, Toledo, Marisol, Pickavance, Georgia, Malhi, Yadvinder, Singh, James, Martinez, Rodolfo Vasquez, Chao, Kuo-Jung, Quesada, Carlos, Brown, Foster, Lewis, Simon L., Honorio Coronado, Eurídice, del Aguila Pasquel, Jhon, Camargo, Plínio Barbosa, Talbot, Joey, Higuchi, Niro, Zagt, Roderick, Gloor, Emanuel, Correa, Zorayda Restrepo, Pardo, Guido, Peacock, Julie, Torre, Emilio Vilanova, Torres-Lezama, Armando, Di Fiore, Anthony, Jimenez-Rojas, Eliana, Galbraith, David, Poorter, Lourens, Stahl, Clement, Prieto, Adriana, Peñuela-Mora, Maria Cristina, Boot, René, Silveira, Marcos, Gamarra, Luis Valenzuela, Andrade, Ana, Swamy, Varun, Terborgh, John, Houwing-Duistermaat, Jeanne, Brienen, Roel J. W., Laurance, Susan, Nogueira Lima, Adriano José, Chave, Jerome, Marimon, Beatriz, Rudas, Agustín, Mendoza, Casimiro, Salomão, Rafael, Moscoso, Victor Chama, Burba

2020

Overview

The carbon sink capacity of tropical forests is substantially affected by tree mortality. However, the main drivers of tropical tree death remain largely unknown. Here we present a pan-Amazonian assessment of how and why trees die, analysing over 120,000 trees representing > 3800 species from 189 long-term RAINFOR forest plots. While tree mortality rates vary greatly Amazon-wide, on average trees are as likely to die standing as they are broken or uprooted—modes of death with different ecological consequences. Species-level growth rate is the single most important predictor of tree death in Amazonia, with faster-growing species being at higher risk. Within species, however, the slowest-growing trees are at greatest risk while the effect of tree size varies across the basin. In the driest Amazonian region species-level bioclimatic distributional patterns also predict the risk of death, suggesting that these forests are experiencing climatic conditions beyond their adaptative limits. These results provide not only a holistic pan-Amazonian picture of tree death but large-scale evidence for the overarching importance of the growth–survival trade-off in driving tropical tree mortality. Tree mortality has been shown to be the dominant control on carbon storage in Amazon forests, but little is known of how and why Amazon forest trees die. Here the authors analyse a large Amazon-wide dataset, finding that fast-growing species face greater mortality risk, but that slower-growing individuals within a species are more likely to die, regardless of size.

• Publisher: Nature Publishing Group UK,Nature Publishing Group,Nature Portfolio
• Subject: 704/158/2450 / 704/158/2454 / Bioclimatology / Biomass / Brazil / Carbon Dioxide / Carbon Sequestration / Carbon sinks / Climatic conditions / Death / Ecological effects / Ecology / Ecology, environment / Ecosystem / Ecosystems / Environmental Monitoring / Forests / Growth rate / Health risks / Humanities and Social Sciences / Life Sciences / Models, Biological / Mortality / Mortality risk / multidisciplinary / Proportional Hazards Models / Risk analysis / Risk Factors / Science / Science (multidisciplinary) / Species / Trees / Trees - growth & development / Tropical Climate / Tropical forests