Data from: Fruiting strategies of perennial plants: a resource budget model to couple mast seeding to pollination efficiency and resource allocation strategies

Masting, a breeding strategy common in perennial plants, is defined by seed production that is highly variable over years and synchronized at the population level. Resource budget models (RBMs) proposed that masting relies on two processes: (i) the depletion of plant reserves following high fruiting levels, which leads to marked temporal fluctuations in fruiting; and (ii) outcross pollination that synchronizes seed crops among neighboring trees. We revisited the RBM approach to examine the extent to which masting could be impacted by the degree of pollination efficiency, by taking into account various logistic relationships between pollination success and pollen availability. To link masting to other reproductive traits, we split the reserve depletion coefficient into three biological parameters related to resource allocation strategies for flowering and fruiting. While outcross pollination is considered to be the key mechanism that synchronizes fruiting in RBMs, our model counterintuitively showed that intense masting should arise under low-efficiency pollination. When pollination is very efficient, medium-level masting may occur, provided that the costs of female flowering (relative to pollen production) and of fruiting (maximum fruit set and fruit size) are both very high. Our work highlights the powerful framework of RBMs, which include explicit biological parameters, to link fruiting dynamics to various reproductive traits and to provide new insights into the reproductive strategies of perennial plants.

大年结实（masting）是多年生植物常见的繁殖策略，其特征为种子产量逐年大幅波动，且在种群水平上保持同步。资源预算模型（resource budget models，RBMs）提出，大年结实依赖两个核心过程：（i）高结实水平后植物储备的消耗，这会导致结实过程出现显著的时间波动；（ii）异交授粉（outcross pollination），使邻近树木间的种子产量实现同步。本研究重新审视了RBMs分析框架，通过考量授粉成功率与花粉可获得性之间的多种逻辑斯蒂关系，探究授粉效率高低对大年结实的影响程度。为将大年结实与其他繁殖性状建立关联，本研究将储备消耗系数拆分为三个与开花和结实的资源分配策略相关的生物学参数。尽管在RBMs中异交授粉被认为是实现结实同步的核心机制，但本研究模型却得出了反直觉的结论：低效率授粉条件下反而会出现强烈的大年结实现象。当授粉效率极高时，若雌性开花成本（相对于花粉生产的成本）以及结实成本（最大坐果率与果实大小）均处于较高水平，则可能出现中等强度的大年结实现象。本研究凸显了RBMs这一包含明确生物学参数的强大分析框架的价值，其可将结实动态与多种繁殖性状建立关联，并为多年生植物的繁殖策略研究提供全新视角。