Data from: Association between rainfall seasonality and the flowering of epiphytic plants in a neotropical montane forest

The association between the reproductive phenology of epiphytic communities with environmental and ecological factors is scarcely explored. Due to dependence of epiphytes on environmental moisture, the seasonal changes in moisture conditions are likely the primary determinants of their reproductive timing. We examined the water limitation and the pollinator competition hypotheses in the structuring of flowering phenologies of an epiphytic community at a seasonal mountain forest in Costa Rica. Additionally, we addressed the environmental factors that might trigger
floral induction. Using a 24-month dataset of bimonthly flowering recordsfrom 104 species and circular statistics, we found a high flowering seasonality at the species level but a rather low seasonality at the community level. The flowering mid-dates of most epiphytes, particularly from monocotyledonous species, occurred during the wettest months following the expectations of the “water limitation hypothesis”. Epiphytes likely benefit from the increase in moisture and nutrient availability during the rainy season by obtaining resources needed to complete floral development and anthesis, and later fruit and seed maturation. The observed flowering pattern of epiphytes coincides with reproductive patterns informed for terrestrial herbs and shrubs from seasonal tropical ecosystems and suggests shared constrains to sexual reproduction in both ecological guilds in similar climatic conditions. Flowering patterns of congeneric epiphytes in the same pollination guild mostly did not follow the expectations of a pollinator competition scenario. Finally, we discussed the possible combined effect of precipitation, temperature, and daily insolation on floral induction of epiphytic plants suggested by the correlation analysis of environmental variables.