Animals are key to restoring the world’s forests

The study by an international team from the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior, Yale School of the Environment, the New York Botanical Garden, and the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute examined a series of regenerating forests in central Panama spanning 20 to 100 years post-abandonment. The unique long-term data set revealed that animals, by carrying a wide variety of seeds into deforested areas, are key to the recovery of tree species richness and abundance to old-growth levels after only 40-70 years of regrowth.

More information at: www.sciencedaily.com or in Estrada-Villegas et al. (2022)

Photo taken from www.kew.org  by Chris Child