Natural Regeneration: A review of the ecological aspects in the tropical mountain forest of southern Ecuador

Abstract

The natural regeneration is a fundamental characteristic to ensure the sustainability of the floristic resource through the time however there is a bottleneck in its establishment that concentrates in the dispersion and the germination of the seeds. The way the seeds move from one place to another, the changes or strategies they make to take advantage of environmental factors and dispersing agents such as birds and bats are key aspects that must be studied to guarantee the forest’s functionality. Seed germination and seedling establishment are subject to biotic and abiotic factors: light, edaph-ic factors, temperature can have an effect on the spatial distribution of species in tropical forests. Throughout ten years of monitoring of natural regeneration in the tropical mountain forest of San Francisco Reserve, it is observed that although the forest species produce seeds, not all of them can germinate, the germination rates are low and it is reduced the number of individuals who man-age to establish themselves therefore needs to understand how the physiological aspects in these ecosystems develop. Natural regeneration is a cyclical ecological process that depends on specific biotic and abiotic factors, as well as on the anthropic interventions that are made conditional on the future permanence of the species and, therefore, the diversity of the tropical mountain forests. The article presents a review of ecological processes such as the dissemination and seed germination in the tropical mountain forests of southern of Ecuador, which are characterized by the biodiversity that they harbor and by the pressures to which they are subjected.