A Reconsideration of the Reproductive Biology of the Atlantic Forest in the Volta Velha Reserve

Published species lists that include breeding system designations of vascular plants are rare in the primary literature and, thus, can be potentially valuable sources of information for comparative studies. The published list for vascular plants in the Volta Velha Reserve suffered from a number of errors, notably applying the designation of monoecious to all species with imperfect flowers. Here, I reconsider the breeding systems for 97 woody vascular plant species. The majority of species initially categorized as monoecious are found to be hermaphroditic. I then examine the relationship between breeding system and numbers of individuals in a 1 ha plot. The mean number of individuals was marginally higher in dioecious than hermaphroditic and monoecious species combined. Furthermore, although only 28% of the species were characterized as possessing a dioecious breeding system, 42% of the individuals encountered belonged to a dioecious species. These results suggest that dioecious species can, at least under certain circumstances, overcome the reductions in the number of seed-bearing individuals and mate assurance that accompany possessing spatially segregated sexes.