Harvesting has variable effects on demographic rates and population growth across three dry forest tree species

Understanding how anthropogenic activities, such as harvesting, influence plant populations is important to quantify sustainable practices that conserve species of socioeconomic importance. There is limited knowledge on how harvesting of branches and non-timber forest products affect populations of trees in the dry tropics. We measure demographic vital rates of three dry tropical tree species in the presence and absence of harvesting and apply integral projection models to quantify population growth rates, which represent the mean fitness across the life cycle. Our results show that the three species vary in their demographic rates and life history. Harvesting significantly decreases the growth of two species. Current levels of harvesting only significantly decreased the population growth rate of one species that experienced both branch and main stem harvesting. Life table response experiments reveal that the negative effect of harvesting on the population growth rate of this species is...