Seed-eating animals are well known as predators of seeds, but they may also function as seed dispersers. This dissertation deals with the interaction between nut-bearing trees and scatterhoarding rodents, animals that store important amounts of seeds as food reserves in spatially scattered soil surface caches. It studies how large cavi-like rodents - in particular the Red acouchy - disperse and predate upon the seeds of the canopy tree Carapa procera (Meliaceae) at the Nouragues Biological Station, an undisturbed tropical rainforest site in French Guiana, South America.
Patrick Jansen used novel video surveillance and thread-marking techniques to follow the fate of individual seeds throughout the dispersal process, from seed shedding until either death or establishment of a seedling. Within these seed fate experiments, he varied seed size and seed abundance to determine how these plants traits affect scatterhoarding and to test hypotheses on the evolution of large-seediness and mast seeding.
Seminar "Seed disperal, size matters"
A seminar on Scatterhoarding and treeregeneration will be held on February 6, on the occassion of the graduation of Patrick A. Jansen. Please contact prof. dr. Frans Bongers for information on the seminar: telephone +31 (0)317 478029, e-mail frans.bongers@wur.nl.