Fruit and seed traits and vertebrate-fruit interactions of tree species occurring in Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana

Seed dispersal is widely considered as an important mechanism for the conservation of plant diversity. In tropical regions, over 80% of woody plant species are dispersed by vertebrates, often through the consumption of fruits. Our understanding of what drives interactions between vertebrates and fruits is limited.
Through a systematic literature search, we compiled a database of fruit and seed traits and vertebrate-fruit interactions for tree and vertebrate species occurring in the Guianas, with the aim to facilitate research into seed dispersal and seed predation of tree species in the Guianas.
The database was compiled by extracting data from 264 published sources. It consists of 21.082 records, of which 19.039 records contain information about 19 different fruit and seed traits belonging to 1.622 different tree species. The other 2.043 records contain information on vertebrate-fruit interactions between 161 vertebrate species and 464 tree species.