Multiple consumers often attack seeds, seedlings, and adult plants, but their population-level consequences remain uncertain. We examined how insect and small mammal consumers influenced the demography and abundance of the perennial shrub, bush lupine (Lupinus arboreus). In grassland and dune habitats we established replicate experimental lupine populations in 81-m2 plots that were either prote...

We investigated aspects of germination and seedling establishment that might influence the distribution and diversity of Carex species growing in the forest understory. We tested the ability of Carex communis and C. platyphylla to germinate and establish at plots where adult individuals of one of these two species, or one of two other Carex species (C. backii and C. plantaginea), occurred in an...

WHIGHAII, D., and R. SIIIPSON. (Biol. Dept., Rider Coll., Lawrenceville, Ne:v Jersey 08648). Growth, mortality, and biomass partitioning in freshwater t idal wetlmd populations of wild rice (Zizania aquatica Tar. aquatica). Bull. Torrey Bot. Club 104: 347-351. 1977.-Wild rice is a common annual in Delaware River tidal ~retlands. Net production was as high as 20.9 g m" day-I and varied seasonall...

PROBLEM: Eelgrass (Zostera marina) seeds are being used in a variety of both smalland large-scale restoration activities and have been successfully used to initiate recovery of eelgrass in the Virginia seaside coastal lagoons, which lost eelgrass in the 1930s ‘wasting disease’ pandemic (Orth et al. 2006a). However, a major bottleneck with the use of seeds has been the relatively low rate of see...

Seedling establishment is a critical phase in pasture management. Knowledge of the seedling development of new forages is necessary to develop management practices and recommend species mixtures for pasture seedings. We compared seedling growth and development of prairiegrass (Bromus willdenowii Kunth = B. catharticus Vahl), grazing bromegrass (B. stamineus Desv.), and orchardgrass (Dactylis gl...

Gregarious flowering of bamboo species impacts ecosystem properties and conservation, but documentation of these periodic events is difficult. Here, we compare the characteristics of flowering sites and un-flowered patches of an arrow bamboo (Fargesia qinlingensis) in the Qinling Mountains, China, over a 5-year period (2003-2007) after a mast flowering event (2003). We examined flowering culm a...

Although post-dispersal seed predators are common and often reduce seed density, their influence on plant population abundance remains unclear. On the one hand, increasing evidence suggests that many plant populations are seed limited, implying that seed predators could reduce plant abundance. On the other hand,.it is generally uncertain whether the magnitude of seed limitation imposed by grani...

During germination, the embryo axis elongates and the radicle emerges through the surrounding structures of the seed. However, this elongation is not even along the axis, and it has been suggested that the region responsible for radicle protrusion is related to the type of subsequent seedling establishment. Eleven epigeal- and five hypogeal-type species were selected to study endoreduplication,...