# Tropical Dry Forest Diversity, Climatic Response, and Resilience in a Changing Climate
## 3 Tropical Dry Forest Response to Variations in Climate
### Natural Disturbances
#### 3.3.1 Tropical Storms  
In the past decade there have been increases in tropical storms, including Hurricane Otto, the first hurricane to hit the Costa Rican coastline in 2016 (going through the heart of the largest patch of TDF in the country) and Hurricanes Jova (Category 2) and Patricia (Category 4), the first hurricanes to hit the TDF ecosystem on the Mexican Pacific Coast in 2011 and 2015, respectively [96]. These extreme increases in precipitation lead to saturation and super-saturation levels, which negatively impact tree development and water transport and can induce early dormancy [97; 98]. Additionally, hurricanes and extreme precipitation events affect the decomposition levels in forests, both during the event and in subsequent years. In the case of the Mexican TDF, a decrease in litterfall decomposition was observed the year following Hurricane Jova. A drop of \(\sim\)30 mg/day for late-stage forests at Chamela. Further, a reversal of these trends occurred after Patricia [96]. The litterfall did return to normal after two years, however, indicating a level of resiliency in the forests. The vegetation on the coastal plains of Jalisco, Mexico also exhibited a significant decrease in the enhanced vegetation index (EVI) after both hurricanes [99]. Other studies found that deciduous forests showed a higher resilience than semi-deciduous ones [100]. With two hurricanes so close together, however, it was also noted that the  
Figure 5: The relationship between mean annual precipitation and forest biomass for primary and secondary forests. The relationship increases and then levels out in the humid forests [67]. The figure is reproduced under CC 4.0 from Navar-Chaidez [67] and includes additional points for Mata Seca, Brazil, and Santa Rosa, Costa Rica collected from Enviro-Net field data.  
ecosystem had a higher resistance to the first hurricane compared to the second one despite the high resiliency and rapid return to normality for the litterfall, nutrients, and decomposition rates [96].  
Old growth forests in Mexico experience higher severe damage (uprooted, broken trunk, bent trunk; 14%) compared to secondary forests, while secondary forests have a higher tree mortality (7%) in the post-Patricia aftermath [101]. A minor hurricane, such as Jova, halved the number of tree cavities that birds could use for nesting, while larger events had a more substantial effect, shifting the flower and fruit phenology in both deciduous and semi-deciduous areas [100]. Fruit and flower abundance also significantly decreased in the year following Hurricane Jova compared to the one following Hurricane Patricia, and the decrease was more significant for the semi-deciduous forests. Higher fragmentation leads to increased vulnerability and leaves the remaining patches more susceptible to fires post-hurricane. When further extrapolating the damage to the vegetation community and the animals that live there, the hurricanes significantly decreased both bat and small mammal community diversity post-hurricane, but recovery of these populations occurred rapidly [99]. If the frequency of such storms increases in areas that contain TDFs, as we have seen since 2010, there may come the point in time when the resilience of the forests is not substantial enough to mitigate the loss in resistance in both the fauna and flora [102].  
Given the increases in the number of these storms impacting the TDFs, their projected rise in the future, and the current lack of information about their impact on TDF resilience in the short and long term, this line of research is increasingly relevant. Differentiating between the types of damage caused by wind, uprooted versus broken trunks or standing dead trees, and their impact on ecological functions should be a focus for research in coming years.