Understanding life history strategies is a fundamental question in ecology. Organisms face trade-offs in resource allocation between growth, survival, and reproduction, where increasing investment in one area reduces resources for others. Dioecious plants, with separate male and female individuals, provide a unique opportunity to examine tradeoffs resulting from differences in reproductive resource allocation Females typically invest more energy in reproduction than males across a full reproductive cycle.
This differential need to allocate resources to reproduction can manifest in several ways. Females may need to reach a larger size or older age than males before beginning to reproduce in order to build necessary energy reserves required for greater investment in flowers and fruits. Females may also flower less frequently than males to rebuild energy reserves between reproductive bouts.
In this project, I will test for a difference in sex ratio from 1:1, differences in average size and size distribution between males and females, and differences in growth rates in populations of six dioecious Cecropia species in lowland tropical rain forest in Amazonian Ecuador.