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Positive effect of seed size on seedling survival in fire-prone savannas of Australia, Brazil and West Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 October 2006

Gaëlle Lahoreau ,
Sébastien Barot ,
Jacques Gignoux ,
William A. Hoffmann ,
Samantha A. Setterfield  and
Paul R. Williams
Gaëlle Lahoreau
Affiliation:
Laboratoire de Biogéochimie et d'Ecologie des Systèmes Continentaux, UMR 7618, Ecole Normale Supérieure, 46 rue d'Ulm, 75230 Paris Cedex 05, France
Sébastien Barot
Affiliation:
Laboratoire d'Ecologie des Sols Tropicaux, UMR 137, IRD, 32 avenue H. Varagnat, 93143 Bondy, France
Jacques Gignoux
Affiliation:
Laboratoire de Biogéochimie et d'Ecologie des Systèmes Continentaux, UMR 7618, Ecole Normale Supérieure, 46 rue d'Ulm, 75230 Paris Cedex 05, France
William A. Hoffmann
Affiliation:
Department of Botany, Campus Box 7612, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC 27695-7612, United States
Samantha A. Setterfield
Affiliation:
Faculty of Education, Health and Science, Charles Darwin University, Darwin, NR 0909, Australia
Paul R. Williams
Affiliation:
Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service and School of Tropical Biology, James Cook University, PO Box 5597 Townsville, Q 4810, Australia
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Abstract

All plant species face a fundamental reproductive trade-off: for a given investment in seed mass, they can produce either many small seeds or few large seeds. Whereas small seeds favour the germination of numerous seedlings, large seeds favour the survival of seedlings in the face of common stresses such as herbivory, drought or shade (Leishman et al. 2000). One mechanism explaining the better survival of large-seeded species is the seedling size effect (SSE) (Westoby et al. 1996): because seeds with large reserves result in bigger seedlings, seedlings from large-seeded species would have better access to light and/or to reliable water supply than seedlings from small-seeded species.

Keywords

budsresource allocationresproutingroot reservesseed massseedling size
Type
Brief Report
Information
Journal of Tropical Ecology , Volume 22 , Issue 6 , November 2006 , pp. 719 - 722
Copyright
2006 Cambridge University Press

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