Data from: Maximum stem diameter predicts liana population demography

Determining population demographic rates is fundamental to understanding
differences in species life-history strategies and their capacity to
coexist. Calculating demographic rates, however, is challenging and
requires long-term, large-scale censuses. Body size may serve as a simple
predictor of demographic rate; can it act as a proxy for demographic rate
when those data are unavailable? We tested the hypothesis that maximum
body size predicts species’ demographic rate using repeated censuses of
the 77 most common liana species on the Barro Colorado Island, Panama
(BCI) 50-ha plot. We found that maximum stem diameter does predict
species’ population turnover and demography. We also found that lianas on
BCI can grow to the enormous diameter of 635 mm, indicating that they can
store large amounts of carbon and compete intensely with tropical canopy
trees. This study is the first to show that maximum stem diameter can
predict plant species’ demographic rates and that lianas can attain
extremely large diameters. Understanding liana demography is particularly
timely because lianas are increasing rapidly in many tropical forests, yet
their species-level population dynamics remain chronically understudied.
Determining per-species maximum liana diameters in additional forests will
enable systematic comparative analyses of liana demography and potential
influence across forest types.