Masting ontogeny: the largest masting benefits accrue to the largest trees

Both plants and animals display considerable variation in their phenotypic traits as they grow. This variation helps organisms to adapt to specific challenges at different stages of development. Masting, the variable and synchronized seed production across years by a population of plants, is a common reproductive strategy in perennial plants that can enhance reproductive efficiency through increasing pollination efficiency and decreasing seed predation. Masting represents a population-level phenomenon generated from individual plant behaviours. While the developmental trajectory of individual plants influences their masting behaviour, the translation of such changes into benefits derived from masting remains unexplored.

We used 43 years of seed production monitoring in European beech (Fagus sylvatica) to address that gap. The largest improvements in reproductive efficiency from masting happen in the largest trees. Masting leads to a 48-fold reduction in seed predation in large trees compared with 28-fold in small trees. Masting yields a 6-fold increase in pollination efficiency in large trees compared with 2.5-fold in small trees. Paradoxically, although the largest trees show the biggest reproductive efficiency benefits from masting, large trees mast less strongly than small trees.

Apparently suboptimal allocation of effort across years by large plants may be a consequence of anatomical constraints or bet-hedging. Ontogenetic shifts in individual masting behaviour and associated variable benefits have implications for the reproductive potential of plant populations as their age distribution changes, with applications in plant conservation and management.