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Seed Banks, Seed Dispersal and Forest Dynamics
Principal Investigators: Drs. Kathy Winnett-Murray and K. Greg Murray
Understanding the impacts of environmental change on individuals and ecosystems is a prevalent theme in current scientific research; being able to predict the consequences of climate change, toxic pollution, or other ecological disturbances is critical at all levels of resource management and conservation. The primary objective of this project will be to establish baseline information on
forest dynamics (species composition, growth, disturbance, and turnover rates, potential for recruitment and establishment, and seed bank composition) in order to make comparisons among different forests (spatial comparisons) and within forests across different years (temporal comparisons). This will allow us to elucidate common features that drive these patterns and how they may be changing.
In particular, we will investigate current forest composition and predicted changes through time relative to the current composition of the soil seed bank. Additional investigations comparing the physiological tolerance limits of seeds and seedlings of different species will allow us to model projected consequences of particular environmental changes, such as climate and disturbance.
Student researchers will work in the Hope College Nature Preserve, with the possibility of doing comparison studies at other locations. Student researchers will be directly involved in establishing protocol designs and formulating their own specific questions to address with the data collected from this study.
Representative Publications:
- Murray, K.G., K. Winnett-Murray, J. Roberts*, K. Horjus*, W.A. Haber, W. Zuchowski, M. Kuhlmann*, and T.M. Long-Robinson*. In press. The roles of disperser behavior and physical habitat structure in regeneration of post-agricultural fields. Chapter 8, in: R. Myster [ed.]. Post-Agricultural Succession in the Neotropics. Springer U.S., New York.
- Veldman, J.W.*, K.G. Murray, A.L. Hull*, J.M. Garcia-C., W.S. Mungall, G.B. Rotman*, M.P. Plosz*, and L.K. McNamara*. 2006. Chemical Defense and the Persistence of Pioneer Plant Seeds in the Soil of a Tropical Cloud Forest. Biotropica. 39: 87-93.
- Murray, K. G., S. Kinsman, and J. Bronstein. 2000. Plant-animal interactions. In Monteverde: Ecology and Conservation of a Tropical Cloud Forest. Oxford University Press, New York. Edited by N. M. Nadkarni and N. T. Wheelright. Pp. 245-302
- Murray, K.G., and J. Mauricio Garcia-C. 2002. Contributions of seed dispersal and demography to recruitment limitation in a Costa Rican cloud forest. Pp. 323-338, in: Levey, D. J., W. R. Silva, and M. Galetti. (eds) Seed dispersal and frugivory: Ecology, evolution, and conservation. CABI Publishing, Wallingford, UK
- Murray, K.G. 1988. Avian seed dispersal of three neotropical gap-dependent plants. Ecological Monographs 58: 271-298.
- Murray, K.G., S. Russell*, C.M. Picone*, K. Winnett-Murray, W. Sherwood*, and M.L. Kuhlmann*. 1994. Fruit laxatives and seed passage rates in frugivores: consequences for plant reproductive success. Ecology 75: 989-994.
- Murray, K.G. 2000. The importance of different bird species as seed dispersers. Pp. 294-295, in: N.M. Nadkarni and N.T. Wheelwright [eds]. Monteverde: Ecology and Conservation of a Tropical Cloud Forest. Oxford University Press, New York.
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