A Comparison of Species Richness in Buttressed and Non-Buttressed Trees at La Selva Biological Reserve Jeannie Okray, Miriam Jimenez, Jack Green and Patti Laird Introduction Buttress formation is a physiognomic structure commonly associated with many species of emergent trees in primary forest of the tropics. Buttresses have been analyzed using engineer models and are believed to provide support for trees. There is a strong negative correlation between buttressing and bark thickness. Thicker bark tends to be a characteristic of temperate zones and tropical montane areas due to thermal properties. It seems that when temperatures decrease as in mid montane and upper montane wet forests within the tropics the decreased temperature seems to select for lower surface area growth and thicker bark and deeper rooting.
Buttressed trees are among the largest in the La Selva Rainforest.
They provide a microclimate for a variety of species. These big trees are being cut for commercial purposes. Their destruction may result in the loss of a component microclimate of the rainforest. In turn, this may result in the reduction of species richness. We hypothesize that buttressed trees have greater species richness of epiphytic tracheophytes and arthropods than non-buttressed trees, and that buttressed trees in altered areas will lack the species richness of the primary forest.