Biodiversity of the deciduous forest ecosystem
2001
Krystufek, B. (Slovenian Museum of Natural History, Ljubljana (Slovenia))
Deciduous forest is a vertically structured ecosystem with a high primary production. A majority of the plant matter, however, is deposited as wood and accessible only to a limited number of animals. The amount of energy available from fruits and seeds is small (approximately 600 to 3,000 kcal ha-1 year-1), which might be a reason for a fairly low species diversity in a deciduous forest biome. A seasonal availability of resources seems to be even more restrictive, which is further aggravated by several years of fluctuations in seed production of the key tree species. This is why many "forest" animals have broader ecological niches than those that were realised in the climax forest; a great number of forest animals also prefer early succession stages. The edible dormouse (Glis glis) is one of the rare mammals with a pronounced adaptation to oscillations in the resource availability of deciduous forests: hibernation and synchronisation of reproduction with abundance of seed production. While managing the biodiversity of deciduous forests one should keep the successional dynamics and the patchy mosaic structure in mind. Namely, the species diversity is in decline after the system has achieved its climax.
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