Workshop: Diversity and dynamics of herbaceous plant communities in forest ecosystems

Yale University, New Haven CT

Investigators

Abstract

Much of our understanding of how forests work is based on trees because they are the largest and most obvious organisms in forests. However, trees make up less than one quarter of all the plant species in many forests. Vines, epiphytes ("air plants"), and small plants like ferns and wildflowers are more common and just as diverse as trees. Therefore, our understanding of forest biology is limited because these other plants are often quite different from trees. Small, non-woody plants tend to have different ways of living, growing, and reproducing tree than trees. Also, they may respond quite differently to changes in light, water, nutrients, and human activities. These differences from trees mean that we are still unable to answer important questions about plant diversity. For example, how does diversity on the forest floor change with climate and geographic location? And how do differences in rainfall affect what kinds of plants can grow? If we know the answers to these questions, we can also answer questions such as what conditions allow non-native ‘invasive’ plants to spread? And how will plants on the forest floor respond to increasing temperatures or more intense droughts predicted with climate change? To address this lack of understanding, the researchers will run a workshop where they will determine which questions should be prioritized, accounting for feasibility (i.e., what are the low-hanging fruit?) and urgency (i.e., what are critical knowledge gaps for conservation and management?). The workshop will bring together a diverse group of early-career and experienced researchers, with expertise in herbaceous plant taxonomy and systematics, herbaceous plant ecology, forest ecology, ecological sampling techniques, statistical modeling, conservation, and policy. Participants will be selected from a variety of institutions and countries in temperate and tropical regions. The workshop will result in resources made openly available to the scientific community, including a review of recent important research and top fundamental and applied research questions. Additionally, workshop participants will propose standardized methods to embed inventories of herbaceous plants within existing forest monitoring networks, allowing many other researchers to sample herbaceous plants consistently across a wide variety of forest habitats to address the identified research priorities. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.