Study reveals the importance of animals in Panama’s regenerating forests

A new report by an international team from the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior, Yale School of the Environment, the New York Botanical Garden, and the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, has discovered that animals are unique protagonists of forest recovery.?

Their study examined a series of regenerating forests in central Panama, from 20 to 100 years post-abandonment, and revealed that animals, by carrying a wide variety of seeds into deforested areas, are key to the recovery of tree species richness and abundance to old-growth levels after only 40-70 years of regrowth.?

Published in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, the report offers the most detailed data of animal seed dispersal recovery across the longest timeframe of natural restoration, and reads that in the tropics, over 80% of tree species can be dispersed by animals who transport seeds throughout the landscape.?

Young regenerating forests are made up mostly of trees dispersed by small birds. But as the forest ages, trees dispersed by larger birds increased, and the majority of plants were dispersed by terrestrial mammals across all forest ages from 20 years old to old growth.

For the MVP, this study is yet more proof that ensuring that our biological corridor remains intact is critical for the long-term stability of the species that populate our Preserve and also for our reforestation efforts.

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