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Amazon forest fragmentation and edge effects temporarily favored understory and midstory tree growth

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Abstract

The current increase in deforestation rates of the Brazilian Amazon raises important questions about the resilience of trees in distinct vertical profiles in the world’s largest tropical rainforest. Seeking to prove the existence of temporal differences in tree growth response after forest fragmentation and edge effects through a dendrochronological perspective, we revealed that Theobroma sylvestre Mart. (Malvaceae), a typically understory and midstory strata tree of the Amazon upland forest (terra firme), increased the basal area increment rates compared to the forest interior, mainly over the first 20 years after forest fragmentation and edge effects. This pattern could not be extrapolated to the entire vertical forest profile, considering previous dendrochronological evidences from trees located in the forest canopy that presented an opposite pattern, a negative increment rate after forest fragmentation and edge creation. These divergences suggest that trees under the canopy of Amazon terra firme forest can be more tolerant to environmental stress (i.e. more incidence of droughts) derived by microclimatic and structural changes in forest subjected to forest fragmentation and edge effects processes, however, future dendroclimatic studies may confirm these hypotheses. In this sense, we highlighted that the increase in basal area increment of trees in the understory and midstory exposed to edge effects may indicate an important component of above-ground biomass stock recovery after forest fragmentation. This fact should be considered in forest management and restoration practices, promoting a new perspective on forest resilience ability after forest fragmentation and its strong impact on plant productivity and capacities in long-term carbon storage.

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Acknowledgements

This work was funded by the Rufford Small Grant for Nature Conservation (http://www.rufford.org/, RSGA application 18762-1), BDFFP Thomas Lovejoy research fellowship program, FAPESP-NSF/PIRE 2017/50085-3; FAPESP 2009/53951-7; CAPES/PROCAD Amazônia 2018, Process: 88881.199859/2018-01; and conducted during a scholarship supported by the International Cooperation Program CAPES/PVE (process: 88887.127558/2016-00) at Laboratorio de Dendrocronología y Ciencias Ambientales from the Instituto Argentino de Nivología, Glaciología y Ciencias Ambientales (IANIGLA-CONICET), Mendoza, Argentina. The first author was supported by a Ph.D. scholarship from CAPES—Brazilian Federal Agency for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel. This is the number 818 publication of the Biological Dynamics of Forest Fragment Project (BDFFP—INPA/STRI) Technical Series.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Wood Anatomy and Tree-Ring Laboratory, Department of Forest Sciences, Luiz de Queiroz College of Agriculture, University of São Paulo, Av. Pádua Dias 11, P.O. Box 9, Piracicaba, SP, 13418-900, Brazil

    Alci Albiero-Júnior, Fidel Alejandro Roig & Mario Tomazello-Filho

  2. Hémera Centro de Observación de la Tierra, Escuela de Ingeniería Forestal, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad Mayor, 8340589, Santiago, Chile

    Alejandro Venegas-González & Fidel Alejandro Roig

  3. Biological Dynamics of Forest Fragments Project (BDFFP), Manaus, AM, Brazil

    José Luís Campana Camargo

  4. Laboratorio de Dendrocronología e Historia Ambiental, IANIGLA, CCT CONICET Mendoza, CC 330, M5502IRA, Mendoza, Argentina

    Fidel Alejandro Roig

  5. Facultad de Ciencias Agrarias, Universidad Nacional de Cuyo, Almirante Brown 500, Mendoza, Argentina

    Fidel Alejandro Roig

  6. Department of Forest Sciences, Federal University of Amazonas, Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil

    Alci Albiero-Júnior

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  1. Alci Albiero-Júnior
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Albiero-Júnior, A., Venegas-González, A., Camargo, J.L.C. et al. Amazon forest fragmentation and edge effects temporarily favored understory and midstory tree growth. Trees 35, 2059–2068 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00468-021-02172-1

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