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Tree mode of death and mortality risk factors across Amazon forests.

ABSTRACT: 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.

SUBMITTER: Esquivel-Muelbert A

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7652827 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Tree mode of death and mortality risk factors across Amazon forests.

Esquivel-Muelbert Adriane A Phillips Oliver L OL Brienen Roel J W RJW Fauset Sophie S Sullivan Martin J P MJP Baker Timothy R TR Chao Kuo-Jung KJ Feldpausch Ted R TR Gloor Emanuel E Higuchi Niro N Houwing-Duistermaat Jeanne J Lloyd Jon J Liu Haiyan H Malhi Yadvinder Y Marimon Beatriz B Marimon Junior Ben Hur BH Monteagudo-Mendoza Abel A Poorter Lourens L Silveira Marcos M Torre Emilio Vilanova EV Dávila Esteban Alvarez EA Del Aguila Pasquel Jhon J Almeida Everton E Loayza Patricia Alvarez PA Andrade Ana A Aragão Luiz E O C LEOC Araujo-Murakami Alejandro A Arets Eric E Arroyo Luzmila L Aymard C Gerardo A GA Baisie Michel M Baraloto Christopher C Camargo Plínio Barbosa PB Barroso Jorcely J Blanc Lilian L Bonal Damien D Bongers Frans F Boot René R Brown Foster F Burban Benoit B Camargo José Luís JL Castro Wendeson W Moscoso Victor Chama VC Chave Jerome J Comiskey James J Valverde Fernando Cornejo FC da Costa Antonio Lola AL Cardozo Nallaret Davila ND Di Fiore Anthony A Dourdain Aurélie A Erwin Terry T Llampazo Gerardo Flores GF Vieira Ima Célia Guimarães ICG Herrera Rafael R Honorio Coronado Eurídice E Huamantupa-Chuquimaco Isau I Jimenez-Rojas Eliana E Killeen Timothy T Laurance Susan S Laurance William W Levesley Aurora A Lewis Simon L SL Ladvocat Karina Liana Lisboa Melgaço KLLM Lopez-Gonzalez Gabriela G Lovejoy Thomas T Meir Patrick P Mendoza Casimiro C Morandi Paulo P Neill David D Nogueira Lima Adriano José AJ Vargas Percy Nuñez PN de Oliveira Edmar Almeida EA Camacho Nadir Pallqui NP Pardo Guido G Peacock Julie J Peña-Claros Marielos M Peñuela-Mora Maria Cristina MC Pickavance Georgia G Pipoly John J Pitman Nigel N Prieto Adriana A Pugh Thomas A M TAM Quesada Carlos C Ramirez-Angulo Hirma H de Almeida Reis Simone Matias SM Rejou-Machain Maxime M Correa Zorayda Restrepo ZR Bayona Lily Rodriguez LR Rudas Agustín A Salomão Rafael R Serrano Julio J Espejo Javier Silva JS Silva Natalino N Singh James J Stahl Clement C Stropp Juliana J Swamy Varun V Talbot Joey J Ter Steege Hans H Terborgh John J Thomas Raquel R Toledo Marisol M Torres-Lezama Armando A Gamarra Luis Valenzuela LV van der Heijden Geertje G van der Meer Peter P van der Hout Peter P Martinez Rodolfo Vasquez RV Vieira Simone Aparecida SA Cayo Jeanneth Villalobos JV Vos Vincent V Zagt Roderick R Zuidema Pieter P Galbraith David D

Nature communications 20201109 1

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 ecologica ...[more]

PMID: 33168823

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Project description:BACKGROUND:Several independent lines of evidence suggest that Amazon forests have provided a significant carbon sink service, and also that the Amazon carbon sink in intact, mature forests may now be threatened as a result of different processes. There has however been no work done to quantify non-land-use-change forest carbon fluxes on a national basis within Amazonia, or to place these national fluxes and their possible changes in the context of the major anthropogenic carbon fluxes in the region. Here we present a first attempt to interpret results from ground-based monitoring of mature forest carbon fluxes in a biogeographically, politically, and temporally differentiated way. Specifically, using results from a large long-term network of forest plots, we estimate the Amazon biomass carbon balance over the last three decades for the different regions and nine nations of Amazonia, and evaluate the magnitude and trajectory of these differentiated balances in relation to major national anthropogenic carbon emissions. RESULTS:The sink of carbon into mature forests has been remarkably geographically ubiquitous across Amazonia, being substantial and persistent in each of the five biogeographic regions within Amazonia. Between 1980 and 2010, it has more than mitigated the fossil fuel emissions of every single national economy, except that of Venezuela. For most nations (Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guyana, Peru, Suriname) the sink has probably additionally mitigated all anthropogenic carbon emissions due to Amazon deforestation and other land use change. While the sink has weakened in some regions since 2000, our analysis suggests that Amazon nations which are able to conserve large areas of natural and semi-natural landscape still contribute globally-significant carbon sequestration. CONCLUSIONS:Mature forests across all of Amazonia have contributed significantly to mitigating climate change for decades. Yet Amazon nations have not directly benefited from providing this global scale ecosystem service. We suggest that better monitoring and reporting of the carbon fluxes within mature forests, and understanding the drivers of changes in their balance, must become national, as well as international, priorities.

Dataset Information

Tree mode of death and mortality risk factors across Amazon forests.

Publications

Tree mode of death and mortality risk factors across Amazon forests.

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