Will Edwards

• James Cook University

Much of the lowland tropical forests in the Solomon Islands have been heavily logged. However, little is known about the recovery status of these forests. We examined factors that influenced the recovery of forest structural attributes within 50 years after selective logging on Kolombangara Island in the western Solomon Islands. Twelve study sites—...

Consumer communities play an important role in maintaining ecosystem structure and function. In seagrass systems, algal regulation by mesograzers provides a critical maintenance function which promotes seagrass productivity. Consumer communities also represent a key link in trophic energy transfer and buffer negative effects to seagrasses associate...

Ecosystem monitoring is fundamental to our understanding of how ecosystem change is impacting our natural resources and is vital for developing evidence‐based policy and management. However, the different types of ecosystem monitoring, along with their recommended applications, are often poorly understood and contentious. Varying definitions and st...

Environmental monitoring data is fundamental to our understanding of environmental change and is vital to evidence-based policy and management. However, different types of ecological monitoring, along with their different applications, are often poorly understood and contentious. Varying definitions and strict adherence to a specific monitoring typ...

(You are invited to visit the Journal's page to view the video abstract.) The global challenge of understanding and forecasting ecosystem responses to climate extremes and climate change is addressed in this review of research enabled through environmental research infrastructure (RI) provided by Australia's Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network...

While the conservation role of remaining natural habitats in anthropogenic landscapes is clear, the degree to which agricultural matrices impose limitations to animal use is not well understood, but vital to assess species’ resilience to land use change. Using an occupancy framework, we evaluated how oil palm plantations affect the occurrence and h...

Lianas (woody climbers) are structural parasites of trees that compete with them for light and below-ground resources. Most studies of liana–tree interactions are based on ground-level observations of liana stem density and size, with these assessments generally assumed to reflect the amount of liana canopy cover and overall burden to the tree. We...

As oil palm plantations continue to expand in Neotropical regions, identifying critical transitions in land use, at which animal communities can be drastically altered, is crucial for conservation planning. Here, we investigated potential unexpected change points (thresholds) in the response of terrestrial mammal's richness and community compositio...

Determining if the seasonality of leaf litter invertebrate populations in tropical rainforests is driven by climate or availability of litter, or both, is important to more accurately predict the vulnerability of litter invertebrates to climate change. Here we used two approaches to disentangle these effects. First, the influence of climatic season...

The rapid expansion of oil palm cultivation in the Neotropics has generated great debate around possible biodiversity impacts. Colombia, for example, is the largest producer of oil palm in the Americas, but the effects of oil palm cultivation on native fauna are poorly understood. Here, we compared how richness, abundance and composition of terrest...

Terrestrial mammal species detected by camera trapping surveys (Aug. 2014 ‒ Dec. 2015) in oil palm plantations and riparian forests in Llanos, Colombia. (DOCX)

Multispecies generalized linear models examining the relationship between the abundance of medium and large terrestrial mammal species and selected landscape covariates in the Llanos region, Colombia. (DOCX)

Model selection output comparing all possible combinations for the effect of variables on mammalian species richness at the landscape level. (DOCX)

Model selection output comparing all possible combinations for the effect of variables on mammalian species richness within oil palm plantation level. (DOCX)

Model selection output comparing all possible combinations for the effect of variables on mammalian species richness within riparian forest level. (DOCX)

Images of the study area in the Llanos region of Colombia (Meta Department). a) Aerial photographs (August 2014) of the landscape highlighting riparian forest and oil palm plantations structure. b) Differences in management schemes of understory vegetation in oil palm plantations in Llanos, Colombia. Photo credit: L.E.Pardo. (PDF)

The relationship between mammal species abundance and selected landscape variables in the Llanos region Colombia. Coefficients are from the saturated model using the multispecies generalized linear modelling prior to shrinkage with Lasso penalty (R package mvabund). SE is the standard error of the coefficient. For scientific names and details of th...

Closed-canopy forests are being rapidly fragmented across much of the tropical world. Determining the impacts of fragmentation on ecological processes enables better forest management and improves species-conservation outcomes. Lianas are an integral part of tropical forests but can have detrimental and potentially complex interactions with their h...

Human-induced forest fragmentation poses one of the largest threats to global diversity yet its impact on rattans (climbing palms) has remained virtually unexplored. Rattan is arguably the world’s most valuable non-timber forest product though current levels of harvesting and land-use change place wild populations at risk. To assess rattan response...

Tall plant species disperse further distances than do short species, within and across dispersal syndromes, yet the driver underpinning this relationship is unclear. The ability of taller plants to invest more in dispersal structures may explain the positive relationship between plant height and dispersal distance. Here, we quantify the cross‐speci...

Exposure to tobacco smoke and particulates from biomass fuel smoke are a risk factors for Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD). Papua New Guinea has a high prevalence of smoking, which is a leading cause of COPD. In addition to tobacco use, many families in PNG also use fuels producing particulate smoke for cooking (e.g. wood, charcoal or k...

Theory predicts unified sex ratios for most organisms, yet biases may be engendered by selfish genetic elements such as endosymbionts that kill or feminize individuals with male genotypes. Although rare, feminization is established for Wolbachia-infected Eurema butterflies. This paradigm is presently confined to islands in the southern Japanese arc...

Tropical forests are major contributors to the terrestrial global carbon pool, but this pool is being reduced via deforestation and forest degradation. Relatively few studies have assessed carbon storage in degraded tropical forests. We sampled 37,000 m2 of intact rainforest, degraded rainforest and sclerophyll forest across the greater Wet Tropics...

Tropical forests in the Solomon Islands have been heavily logged in the last century. However, little is known about forest recovery dynamics across this region. Extrapolating findings from logged forests in tropical mainlands or large continental landbridge islands to isolated archipelagos such as the Solomons is inappropriate because succession a...

Wildlife rehabilitation can contribute to species conservation by releasing healthy individuals back into the wild and educating the public about threatening processes. Rehabilitation has substantial financial costs, however, and thus it is important to understand the success rates of these potential conservation management actions. We quantified t...

Forests of Asia-Pacific islands have undergone degradation by some of the worst-known selective logging practices in the tropics. It is unclear whether severely damaged forests can return to a pre-logging state via natural regeneration, or whether active restoration is required. In this review, we highlight how the socioeconomic dynamics in the Sol...

The inexorable expansion of oil palm plantations has been a major driver of biodiversity loss in the tropics. This is particularly evident in Malaysia and Indonesia, where the majority of the world’s oil palm is cultivated. In Latin America oil palm acreage has also been steadily increasing, especially in countries such as Colombia, the largest pro...

The lack of capacity to monitor forest carbon stocks in developing countries is undermining global efforts to reduce carbon emissions. Involving local people in monitoring forest carbon stocks could potentially address this capacity gap. This study conducts a complete expert remeasurement of community-led biomass inventories in remote tropical fore...

The Island of New Guinea is renowned for its high biodiversity, which arises in part from its complex geology and topographical variability. The island is, however, relatively understudied. We surveyed forest plant communities in the poorly studied Naoro-Brown catchment of the West Koiari region of Papua New Guinea. We identified four forest types—...

Among co-occurring species, values for functionally important plant traits span orders of magnitude, are uni-modal, and generally positively skewed. Such data are usually log-transformed "for normality" but no convincing mechanistic explanation for a log-normal expectation exists. Here we propose a hypothesis for the distribution of seed masses bas...

Can the strategic incorporation of lianas (woody vines) into rainforest restoration plantings enhance biodiversity-conservation outcomes? Lianas are an integral component of primary tropical rainforests yet are often omitted from rainforest restoration plantings as they may damage trees and compete with them for resources. However, there is increas...

Can the strategic incorporation of lianas (woody vines) into rainforest restoration plantings enhance biodiversity-conservation outcomes? Lianas are an integral component of primary tropical rainforests yet are often omitted from rainforest restoration plantings as they may damage trees and compete with them for resources. However, there is increas...

Different kinds of species interactions can lead to different structures within ecological networks. Antagonistic interactions (such as between herbivores and host plants) often promote increasing host specificity within a compartmentalized network structure, whereas mutualistic networks (such as pollination networks) are associated with higher lev...

Many contemporary ecosystems are likely to be affected by multiple environmental drivers, complicating efforts to predict future changes in those ecosystems. We studied long-term changes (1980-2012) in forest dynamics and liana (woody vine) abundance and biomass in fragmented and intact forests of the central Amazon. We did so by contrasting trends...

AimThe plight of the world's biodiversity hotspots has been paralleled by a debate over how to best prioritize or maximize gain of biodiversity for conservation. Approaches to date have focused on quantifying species, habitat, phylogenetic or other types of diversity. The importance of preserving evolutionary distinctiveness or phylogenetic diversi...

Understanding forest dynamics within remnant fragments of tropical forest is a vital priority if we are to manage them effectively for biodiversity conservation. Lianas (woody vines) are well known to interact antagonistically with trees, and if they flourish in older forest fragments they may promote detrimental ecological impacts and fragment deg...

Lianas (climbing woody vines) are important structural parasites of tropical trees and may be increasing in abundance in response to global‐change drivers. We assessed long‐term (∼14‐year) changes in liana abundance and forest dynamics within 36 1‐ha permanent plots spanning ∼600 km ² of undisturbed rainforest in central Amazonia. Within each plot,...

Lianas (climbing woody vines) are important structural parasites of tropical trees and may be increasing in abundance in response to global-change drivers. We assessed long-term (similar to 14-year) changes in liana abundance and forest dynamics within 36 1-ha permanent plots spanning similar to 600 km(2) of undisturbed rainforest in central Amazon...

Data sets and scripts used in "SPlus for the Analysis of Biological Data"

A complete guide to the statistical analysis of Whitlock & Schluter's The Analysis of Biuological Data, using SPlus statistical analysis software. With a few extra things thrown in . . .mixed models, ANCOVA, Repeated Measures . .

Many sit‐and‐wait predators use conspicuous displays of color to attract prey. These displays sometimes express discrete polymorphisms; however, the adaptive drivers of such variation are not well understood. Here, we explore a previously unknown color polymorphism in the orb‐web spider Gasteracantha fornicata. We discovered that in North Queenslan...

Premise of the study: Sprouting in woody plants promotes persistence in the face of disturbance, ultimately influencing population structure. Different disturbance regimes drive variable population responses, but there have been few direct tests of the relative differences in population structure to specific drivers. We measured population structu...

Tropical rainforest canopies are renowned for their high invertebrate diversity and abundance. The canopy comprises a range of microhabitats representing very different food resources (including photosynthetic, reproductive, and structural tissues). As these resources vary considerably in temporal and spatial availability, nutritional quality, chem...

Abstract. 1. Beetles (Coleoptera) are the most species-rich and ecologically diverse group of organisms in tropical rainforest canopies. This study reports on the distribution of the beetle community on five discrete canopy microhabitats (mature leaves, new leaves, flowers, fruit, and suspended dead wood) on 23 tree species in an Australian tropica...

Reliable estimates of host specificity in tropical rainforest beetles are central for an understanding of food web dynamics and biodiversity patterns. However, it is widely assumed that herbivores constitute the majority of host specific species, and that most herbivore species feed on leaves. We tested the generality of this assumption by comparin...

Bees are known to provide pollination services to a wide range of crops, yet flies are rarely included in estimates of function. As bees and flies differ markedly in their life history characteristics and resource needs, they may be active and hence provide pollination services at different times of the day. Here, we explore the differences in bee...

Abstract. 1. Factors such as reproductive fitness, climatic tolerance, predation pressure, energetic requirements and the quality and quantity of food sources all correlate with invertebrate body sizes. 2. This study examines body size variation between an invertebrate community inhabiting five different microhabitats (mature leaves, new leaves, fl...

Most plant species have a range of traits that deter herbivores. However, understanding of how different defences are related to one another is surprisingly weak. Many authors argue that defence traits trade off against one another, while others argue that they form coordinated defence syndromes. We collected a dataset of unprecedented taxonomic an...

Insect biodiversity peaks in tropical rainforest environments where a large but as yet unknown proportion of species are found in the canopy. While there has been a proliferation of insect biodiversity research undertaken in the rainforest canopy, most studies focus solely on insects that inhabit the foliage. In a recent paper, we examined the dist...

Context The west coast of the Cape York Peninsula (CYP) is a major nesting ground for three species of threatened marine turtle, namely, the flatback (Natator depressus), olive ridley (Lepidochelys olivacea) and hawksbill (Eretemochelys imbricata). Marine turtle nests in this area experience high rates of depredation and unpublished data from numer...

Estimates suggest that perhaps 40% of all invertebrate species are found in tropical rainforest canopies. Extrapolations of total diversity and food web analyses have been based almost exclusively on species inhabiting the foliage, under the assumption that foliage samples are representative of the entire canopy. We examined the validity of this as...

a–v. The density of invertebrates on each microhabitat on each tree species. The density/kg (± S.E.) of invertebrates on each of the 22 tree species for which at least two of the three focal microhabitats were sampled (all species except Musgravia heterophylla). Note that the data are presented on a log scale. Missing columns signify that no sample...

Almost 50% of all seed plants produce desiccation‐sensitive seeds. For these species, pre‐germination survival may be equally as important a basis of seed trait selection as seedling establishment. However, few studies have explored correlations among seed traits considered influential in the retention of viability prior to germination. We examine...

1. We tested the hypotheses that feeding guild structure of beetle assemblages changed with different arboreal microhabitats and that these differences were consistent across rainforest tree species. 2. Hand collection and beating techniques were used from the gondola of the Australian Canopy Crane to collect beetles from five microhabitats (mature...

1. Recent declines in honeybee populations have focused attention on the potential for unmanaged insects to replace them as pollinators of food crops. The capacity of unmanaged pollinators to replace services currently provided by honeybees depends on the spatial and temporal variability of these services, but few quantitative assessments currently...

This manual is designed to to teach people to use the statistical software S-Plus and to support the process of learning statistical concepts and methods. It covers both use of the graphical user interface and the SPlus command language (which is almost identical to the command language of R). Topics covered include descriptive and exploratory stat...

Models of impacts of climate change on species are generally based on correlations between current distributions and climatic variables, rather than a detailed understanding of the mechanisms that actually limit distribution. Many of the vertebrates endemic to rainforests of northeastern Australia are restricted to upland forests and considered to...

• It has long been believed that plant species from the tropics have higher levels of traits associated with resistance to herbivores than do species from higher latitudes. A meta-analysis recently showed that the published literature does not support this theory. However, the idea has never been tested using data gathered with consistent methods f...

Aim Dispersal distances of insect pollinators are critical in defining their contribution to landscape‐wide pollen movement and ultimately gene flow in natural and agricultural systems. We ask whether bee and fly pollinator taxa differ in their dispersal distances and transport of viable pollen in a human‐modified system. Location Canterbury and Ot...

Many sit-and-wait predators use conspicuous displays of color to attract prey. These displays sometimes express discrete polymorphisms; however, the adaptive drivers of such variation are not well understood. Here, we explore a previously unknown color polymorphism in the orb-web spider Gasteracantha fornicata. We discovered that in North Queenslan...

Leaves come in many sizes and shapes, and the relationships between leaf traits and the environments they occur in are better understood every day. However we still know very little about the ecological consequences of plants having either compound or simple leaves. We attempted to address this knowledge gap by comparing chemical and physical chara...

We review the ways in which two of Charles Darwin's lesser known works, The Movement and Habit of Twining Plants and The Power of Movement in Plants, stimulated 20th and 21st century research findings and philosophies. The legacy of Darwin's work permeates research on plant movement. For example, Darwin's demonstration that coleoptiles and roots fa...

We tested the hypothesis that dispersal periods of recalcitrant seeded species were coincident with the wet season in a seasonal tropical forest in Australia. Unlike similar forests, we found no support for this pattern. Intensification of seasonal aridity may increase mortality in desiccation-sensitive seeds.

Reduction in rainfall and intensification of dry season moisture deficit threaten to expose desiccation-sensitive seeds in the seasonal tropics to greater potential negative effects of desiccation. A determinate affecting the recruitment of species under increased aridity is how quickly desiccation-sensitive seeds dehydrate. We investigated the rat...

1. The honeybee Apis mellifera is currently in decline worldwide because of the combined impacts of Colony Collapse Disorder and the Varroa destructor mite. In order to gain a balanced perspective of the importance of both wild and managed pollination services, it is essential to compare these services directly, a priori, within a cropping landscap...

We review the ways in which two of Charles Darwin's lesser known works, The Movement and Habit of Twining Plants and The Power of Movement in Plants, stimulated 20th and 21st century research findings and philosophies. The legacy of Darwin's work permeates research on plant movement. For example, Darwin's demonstration that coleoptiles and roots fa...

Abstract 1. Explanations for web relocation invoking optimal foraging require reliable differentiation between individual sites and overall habitat quality. We characterised natural conditions of resource variability over 20 days in artificial webs of the orb-web spider Gasteracantha fornicata to examine this requirement. 2. Variability in catch su...

Abstract The ability to withstand disturbance (resistance) and the ability to recover biomass following disturbance (resilience) were investigated in Australian wet tropical rainforest tree species. These two attributes are expected to be negatively correlated, because investment of biomass in structural support (conferring resistance) results in t...

Aim To examine, at a global scale, patterns in the direction in which climbing plants twine. We tested three hypotheses: (1) that twining direction is determined randomly; (2) that twining direction is determined by apices following the apparent movement of the sun across the sky; and (3) that twining direction is determined by the Coriolis effect....

Resprouting is a key plant attribute facilitating persistence in disturbance‐prone environments. Resprouting ability in seedlings may depend on both developmental ontogeny and seed size. However, the relationships between these factors are not well explored, especially for woody species with comparatively small seeds and epigeal germination. We inv...

Abstract Fire-triggered release from seed dormancy is a characteristic of many Australian plant species. We investigated aspects of the seed-bank dynamics and dormancy characteristics in seeds of Grevillea barklyana, an understorey shrub of coastal sclerophyll vegetation in the Jervis Bay Region on the south coast of New South Wales. We used two so...

In this paper I develop a null model for the expected relationship between seed mass and the mass of dispersal structure (reward) for vertebrate-dispersed plant species. The model is based on the simple assumption that the reward associated with a given seed mass is commensurate with work required to move it, and predicts that reward mass should sc...

Studies which attempt to explain rarity lineages are becoming increasingly popular. An ability to explain causative factors for rarity based on shared characteristics in an intuitively attractive concept, since it may greatly reduce the number of studies needed to understand rarity in all species. Most studies have used the taxonomic unit of family...

We examine the relationship between the reward offered to ants to disperse seeds (elaiosome size) and seed size, and the possible mechanisms that may generate this relationship in Australian plant species. We used seed and elaiosome sizes from our own data set containing 87 Acacia species, supplemented with 22 species from a previously published da...

We monitored survival of seedlings in 216 1-m 2 quadrats in lowland rain forest in tropical north Queensland between December 2001 and December 2002. During this time, the region experienced severe drought associated with an El Nio Southern Oscillation event. The 2001 census recorded 124 species and 2912 individuals. In late November 2002 (2 wk pri...

Low natural pollination rates produce few and poorly formed fruits in commercial orchards of the custard apple (Annona squamosa x A. cherimola) cultivar 'Hillary White' on the Atherton Tablelands, North Queensland, Australia. To overcome this limitation, conventional practice is to hand-pollinate with pollen from either cv. 'Hillary White' or cv. '...

Abstract In this study we report the results from the first long-term (40 weeks) study of stick-insect fecundity and distribution under natural conditions of which we are aware. We used the number of eggs falling into 72 × 0.5 m2 traps to ask: ‘Was egg production in Sipyloidea sp. uniform across the sample period’? and ‘Was there evidence of host p...

Abstract In 2002, fire burnt areas of Mesophyll- and Notophyll Vine Forest in the Smithfield Conservation Park near Cairns, Australia. We assessed the ability of rainforest plant species to persist through fire via resprouting. Natural rates of mortality and resprouting in unburnt areas were assessed for all saplings (stems < 2 m) via 13, 2 × 50 m...

Using seven tropical rainforest species of north Queensland, Australia, we simulated partial predation and compared the development of intact embryos and embryos from which various proportions had been removed, including in some cases the original root–shoot axis. Embryos of all species contained storage reserve cotyledons and germinate in a hypoge...

Non-uniform scaling of pulp and seed mass has been shown to alter dispersal probabilities in vertebrate dispersed species. Since dispersal in tropical forests is strongly linked to establishment success, processes determining allocation to pulp and seed are likely to impact on parental fitness, and therefore should be under the control of natural s...

We tested the relative influences of plant architecture and whole plant resources as mechanisms for setting flower and fruit production in Crotalaria spectabilis Roth. (Fabaceae). We also examined the effects of plant architecture and competition between flowers and whether low probability of female function in late flowers was associated with an i...

Ponapea palauensis Kaneh., a palm endemic to the Palau archipelago in the western Caroline Islands, has previously been reported to be threatened and in decline due to predation by two species of introduced parrots, Cactua galerita Lath, and Eclectus roratus P. L. S. Mull., and potential predation by introduced rats. Here we assess its threatened s...

In 1999, Dalling & Harms simulated 100% above-ground herbivory on seedlings of Gustavia superba, a large-seeded species from Barro Colorado Island, Panama, and showed the remarkable ability for cotyledons to regenerate up to eight new shoots. They used this evidence to propose that cotyledon size (at least in this species)was adaptive in survivin...

Abstract In October 1999, patches of dead and dying trees were identified in rainforest vegetation throughout the Tully Falls area in north Queensland, Australia. Previous incidents of patch death in the region had been attributed to Phytophthora cinnamomi. The distribution of P. cinnamomi was assessed by testing for its presence in seven sites dis...

AimIn this study we compare the incidence of rarity within lineages between three floras: Australia, North America and New Zealand.Methods We used published data for absolute numbers of species and for numbers of rare species to ask three questions: 1. Do families have similar proportions of rare species in different floras? 2. Can proportions of r...

Idiospermum australiense (Diels) S. T. Blake, is a rare species that produces very large diaspores (up to 225 g) comprising 2–6 cotyledons. Anecdotal evidence suggested that each cotyledon within the diaspore could develop an independent root/shoot axis in natural populations and under glasshouse conditions. To investigate this potential, 13 diaspo...

Recent studies have reported conflicting evidence about correlations between seed size and plant species geographic range sizes. Using phylogenetically independent contrasts (PICs) within genera, we found no consistent differences in reserve mass between species with similar dispersal morphology and «wide» versus «narrow» geographic ranges. There w...