Large isolated trees are a common feature of the agricultural landscape in humid tropical regions originally covered by rain forest. These isolated trees are primarily used as a source of shade for cattle and people. 13 pastures (totalling ca. 80…

Vegetation and environment change mutually during secondary succession, yet the idiosyncrasies of the vegetation effect on the understorey environment are poorly understood. To test whether the successional understorey environment changes predictably and is shaped by the structure and seasonality of…

Structural and floristic attributes of riparian forest patches in a Neotropical savanna were studied in order to evaluate their potential to maintain rain forest plant diversity during periods of drought. Tree density was significantly greater, and basal area significantly lower,…

Analyzing the relationship between the spatial structures of environmental variables and of the associated seedling and sapling communities is crucial to understanding the regeneration processes in forest communities. The degree of spatial structuring (i.e., spatial autocorrelation) of environmental and sapling…

Historical records of burning, field observations, and a manipulation experiment were used to evaluate the extent and impact of fire in a system of gallery forests in the Mountain Pine Ridge savanna, Belize. The outer boundaries of gallery forests are…

Tropical montane cloud forests (TMCF) are among the most threatened ecosystems globally in spite of their high strategic value for sustainable development due to the key role played by these forests in hydrological cycle maintenance and as reservoirs of endemic…