Scatter-hoarding rodents as secondary seed dispersers of a frugivore-dispersed tree Scleropyrum wallichianum in a defaunated Xishuangbanna tropical forest, China  

作　　者：Lin CAO Zhishu XIAO Cong GUO Jin CHEN 

机构地区：[1]Key Laboratory of Bio-resources and Eco-environment,Ministry of Education,College of Life Science,Sichuan University,Chengdu,China [2]State Key Laboratory of Integrated Management of Pest Insects and Rodents in Agriculture,Institute of Zoology,Chinese Academy of Sciences,Beijing,China [3]Chinese Academy of Sciences,Key Laboratory of Tropical Forest Ecology,Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden,Chinese Academy of Sciences,Mengla,Yunnan,China

出　　处：《Integrative Zoology》2011年第3期227-234,共8页整合动物学（英文版）

基　　金：This work was supported by the National Natural Sci-ence Foundation of China(30930016);the State Basic Research Program(2007CB109102);the open fund from the Key Laboratory of Tropical Forest Ecology,Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden,Chinese Acad-emy of Sciences.

摘　　要：Local extinction or population decline of large frugivorous vertebrates as primary seed dispersers,caused by hu-man disturbance and habitat change,might lead to dispersal limitation of many large-seeded fruit trees.However,it is not known whether or not scatter-hoarding rodents as secondary seed dispersers can help maintain natural regeneration(e.g.seed dispersal)of these frugivore-dispersed trees in the face of the functional reduction or loss of primary seed dispersers.In the present study,we investigated how scatter-hoarding rodents affect the fate of tagged seeds of a large-seeded fruit tree(Scleropyrum wallichianum Arnott,1838,Santalaceae)from seed fall to seedling establishment in a heavily defaunated tropical forest in the Xishuangbanna region of Yunnan Province,in south-west China,in 2007 and 2008.Our results show that:(i)rodents removed nearly all S.wallichianum seeds in both years;(ii)a large proportion(2007,75%;2008,67.5%)of the tagged seeds were cached individually in the surface soil or under leaf litters;(iii)dispersal distance of primary caches was further in 2007(19.6±14.6 m)than that in 2008(14.1±11.6 m),and distance increased as rodents recovered and moved seeds from primary caches into subsequent caching sites;and(iv)part of the cached seeds(2007,3.2%;2008,2%)survived to the seedling stage each year.Our study suggests that by taking roles of both primary and secondary seed dispersers,scatter-hoarding rodents can play a significant role in maintaining seedling establishment of S.wallichianum,and are able to at least partly compensate for the loss of large frugivorous vertebrates in seed dispersal.

关 键 词：frugivorous vertebrate scatter-hoarding rodents Scleropyrum wallichianum seed dispersal seedling recruitment 

分 类 号：F42[经济管理—产业经济]