An estimate of the number of tropical tree species

Slik, J.W. Ferry; Arroyo-Rodr�guez, V�ctor; Aiba, Shin-Ichiro; Alvarez-Loayza, Patricia; Alves, Luciana F.; Field, Richard

Abstract

The high species richness of tropical forests has long been recognized, yet there remains substantial uncertainty regarding the actual number of tropical tree species. Using a pantropical tree inventory database from closed canopy forests, consisting of 657,630 trees belonging to 11,371 species, we use a fitted value of Fisher’s alpha and an approximate pantropical stem total to estimate the minimum number of tropical forest tree species to fall between ∼40,000 and ∼53,000, i.e. at the high end of previous estimates. Contrary to common assumption, the Indo-Pacific region was found to be as species-rich as the Neotropics, with both regions having a minimum of ∼19,000–25,000 tree species. Continental Africa is relatively depauperate with a minimum of ∼4,500–6,000 tree species. Very few species are shared among the African, American, and the Indo-Pacific regions. We provide a methodological framework for estimating species richness in trees that may help refine species richness estimates of tree-dependent taxa.

Citation

Slik, J. F., Arroyo-Rodríguez, V., Aiba, S.-I., Alvarez-Loayza, P., Alves, L. F., & Field, R. (2015). An estimate of the number of tropical tree species. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 112(24), https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1423147112

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Publication Date: Jun 1, 2015
• Deposit Date: Jul 9, 2015
• Publicly Available Date: Jul 9, 2015
• Journal: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
• Print ISSN: 0027-8424
• Electronic ISSN: 1091-6490
• Publisher: National Academy of Sciences
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 112
• Issue: 24
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1423147112
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/750648
• Publisher URL: http://www.pnas.org/content/112/33/E4628.short
• Related Public URLs: http://www.pnas.org/content/112/24/7472
• Additional Information: Not all authors listed.
• Contract Date: Jul 9, 2015