The Ecology of Trees in the Tropical Rain Forest [Paperback]

A summary of our understanding of the ecology of tropical rain-forest trees, with particular emphasis on comparative ecology.Current knowledge of the ecology of tropical rain-forest trees is limited, yet a good understanding of the trees is essential to unravelling the workings of the forest itself. This book aims to summarise contemporary understanding of the ecology of tropical rain-forest trees. The emphasis is on comparative ecology, an approach that can help to identify possible adaptive trends and evolutionary constraints and which may also lead to a workable ecological classification for tree species, conceptually simplifying the rain-forest community and making it more amenable to analysis.Current knowledge of the ecology of tropical rain-forest trees is limited, yet a good understanding of the trees is essential to unravelling the workings of the forest itself. This book aims to summarise contemporary understanding of the ecology of tropical rain-forest trees. The emphasis is on comparative ecology, an approach that can help to identify possible adaptive trends and evolutionary constraints and which may also lead to a workable ecological classification for tree species, conceptually simplifying the rain-forest community and making it more amenable to analysis.With detailed information available for perhaps only a few hundred of the many thousand of species that occur, our current knowledge of the ecology of tropical rainforest trees is limited. This book aims to summarize the contemporary understanding of the ecology of tropical rainforest trees. The emphasis is on comparative ecology, an approach that can help to identify possible adaptive trends and evolutionary constraints and that may also lead to a workable ecological classification for tree species, conceptually simplifying the rainforest community and making it more amenable to analysis.Preface; Acknowledgements; 1. Introduction; 2. The growing tree; 3. Tree performance; 4. Reproductive biology; 5. Sl³5