Episodic seedling growth in Allosyncarpia ternata, a lignotuberous, monsoon rainforest tree in northern Australia

Authors: Fordyce, I. R.¹; Eamus, D.²; Duff, G. A.³

Source: Austral Ecology, Volume 25, Number 1, February 2000 , pp. 25-35(11)

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Abstract:

Abstract

On the western Arnhem Land Plateau, Northern Territory, Australia, seedlings of the canopy tree Allosyncarpia ternata S.T. Blake typically spend many years (perhaps decades) as small (<1 m), multistemmed plants on the forest floor. In this establishment phase, long periods of apparent inactivity are interrupted by episodes of rapid growth. This paper describes a 5-year field-monitoring program to examine the pattern of seedling growth and survival in allosyncarpia forest, and field and shadehouse measurements of lignotuber size. Individual seedlings may produce, each wet season, a number of fast-growing stems, which then die back in the following dry season. As a result, mean annual above-ground growth during this life stage is negligible. With each wet season, however, the seedling extends its below ground parts - a large lignotuber and a deep root system. After a number of years, when the lignotuber has grown large enough to sustain massive shoot growth, when a suitable light gap becomes available, and presumably when roots reach reliable dry-season water supplies, the seedling grows rapidly. Thus, the shortage of saplings in allosyncarpia forest is due to the short time that individual plants spend at that particular growth-stage, rather than to any dysfunction in recruitment.

Keywords: Allosyncarpia ternata; Australia; lignotuber; monsoon tropics; Northern Territory; rainforest; seedling growth

Document Type: Research article

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1046/j.1442-9993.2000.01029.x

Affiliations: 1: Department of Soil Science and Plant Nutrition, University of Western Australia, Nedlands, WA 6907, Australia ( Email:, Email: ifordyce@agric.uwa.edu.au 2: School of Biological and Environmental Sciences, Northern Territory University, Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia and 3: Faculty of Science and Technology, Deakin University, Warrnambool, Victoria, Australia

Publication date: 2000-02-01

Episodic seedling growth in Allosyncarpia ternata, a lignotuberous, monsoon rainforest tree in northern Australia

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