Amazonia and the Gran Chaco are the largest phytogeographic units of the Neotropical Region. The Forest Wedge of the Santa Fe province of Argentina is the southernmost part of the Eastern Chaco, and there are three main types of forest, 1) the mixed dense forests, 2) the Schinopsis balansae "quebrachal" and 3) the Prosopis nigra var. ragonesei forests, distributed along an environmental gradien...

Differences in forest productivity due to climate change may result in permanently altered levels of litterfall and litter on the forest floor. Using experimental litter removal and litter addition treatments, we investigated the effects of increased and decreased litterfall on early-stage litter decomposition and the abundance of meso-arthropods in a moist tropical forest. Litterbags containin...

Afforestation of sites disturbed after bauxite mining is the favorite technique to restore all ecosystem functions. The nature tree species used for revegetation post-mining land can accelerate recovery soil organic matter and nutrient cycles. This study aimed determine litterfall production, decomposition rate content from three types forest cover ( Eucalyptus , Anadenanthera peregrina mixed p...

Invasive species pose major threats to the integrity and functioning of ecosystems. When such species alter ecosystem processes, they have the potential to change the environmental context in which other species survive and reproduce and may also facilitate the invasion of additional species. We describe impacts of an invasive N2-fixing tree, Falcataria moluccana, on some of the last intact rem...

Global changes such as variations in plant net primary production are likely to drive shifts in leaf litterfall inputs to forest soils, but the effects of such changes on soil carbon (C) cycling and storage remain largely unknown, especially in C-rich tropical forest ecosystems. We initiated a leaf litterfall manipulation experiment in a tropical rain forest in Costa Rica to test the sensitivit...

Symbiotic nitrogen fixation is one of the major pathways of N input to forest ecosystems, enriching N availability, particularly in lowland tropics. Recently there is growing concern regarding the wide areas of fast-growing leguminous plantations that could alter global N2O emissions. Here, we highlight substantially different N and phosphorus utilization and cycling at a plantation of Acacia m...

South Chilean forest ecosystems represent one of the largest areas of old-growth temperate rainforests remaining in the Southern hemisphere and have a high ecological value, but suffer from deforestation, invasion by exotic species, fragmentation, and increasing atmospheric nitrogen (N) deposition. To support sustainable forest management, more knowledge is required on nutrient cycling of these...

Litterfall has a large influence on carbon and nutrient cycling of ecosystems, particularly in light-limited forested streams, as most nutrients return the form litter. Although recent evidence points to prevalence seasonal litterfall species-rich evergreen tropical riparian forests, there is limited understanding how plant diversity intersects with stream ecosystem functions. To explore this q...

Light canopy transmittance and the Beer-Lambert equation were utilized to assess monthly leaf area index (LAI) of a tropical deciduous forest ecosystem on the west coast of Mexico. The light transmittance coefficient (k) was obtained by analyzing vertical leaf and light distribution in the forest canopy. An independent LAI estimate was obtained using litterfall data. The calculated k value was ...

Fires can generate spatial variation in trophic interactions such as insect herbivory. If trophic interactions mediated by fire influence nutrient cycling, they could feed back on the more immediate consequences of fire on nutrient dynamics. Here we consider herbivore-induced effects on oak litter quality and decomposition within a long-term manipulation of fire frequency in central Minnesota, ...