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Given the potential for increasingly common and intense tropical storms, it is important to understand their effects on island forest communities. Here, the authors show that Hurricane María’s strength and rainfall had larger effects on tree mortality than other less severe storms, and that large trees and species with low-density wood were most susceptible.

An analysis of tree survival data from forest sites worldwide shows that in the tropics, rare tree species experience stronger stabilizing density dependence than common species, wheras no correlation of stabilizing density dependence and abundance exists in the temperate zone.

Analysing data on the relative abundance of basal area of ectomycorrhizal trees from lowland tropical forests, the authors show that their distribution and abundance are independent of soil quality.

Data from 2 million individual trees spanning 1,781 species reveal that tropical forests can be grouped into four size-dependent life-history survival modes, the application of which in demographic simulations predicts biomass change.

A new method to quantify three masting components from individual tree-years has revealed that globally, masting is uncommon in tree species that depend on mutualist dispersers, with its distribution further mediated by climate and nutrient availability.

Competing influences on tropical forest productivity, such as changes in temperature, light and precipitation, can be difficult to disentangle. Now, analysis of how clouds, temperature and precipitation affect flower production in two contrasting tropical forests indicates that temperature is a critically important variable for tropical forest flower production.

The relationships that control seed production in trees are key to understand evolutionary pressures that have shaped forests. A global synthesis of fecundity data reveals that while seed production is not constrained by a strict size-number trade-off, it is influenced by taxonomy and nutrient allocation.

The relationship of mycorrhizal associations with latitudinal gradients in tree beta-diversity is unexplored. Using a global dataset approach, this study examines how trees with arbuscular mycorrhizal and ectomycorrhizal associations contribute to latitudinal beta-diversity patterns and the environmental controls of these patterns.

Data from 42 chronosequence sites show a geater abundance of legumes in seasonally dry forests than in wet forests, particularly during early secondary succession, probably owing to legumes’ nitrogen-fixing ability and reduced leaflet size.

Neotropical tree community composition shows opposing successional pathways for wet and dry forests, but as vegetation cover increases over time, trends converge. Selecting species that have similar wood density to early successional communities could improve reforestation prospects.

Using demographic data for 1,111 tree species across ten tropical forests, the authors test the generality of the growth–mortality trade-off, finding that it holds in undisturbed but not disturbed forests.

A global study suggests that mycorrhizal fungi play a key role in determining forest diversity patterns and community structure, with mycorrhizal tree type systematically mediating the strength of conspecific negative density dependence.

Data from millions of trees in thousands of locations are used to show that certain key traits affect competitive ability in predictable ways, and that there are trade-offs between traits that favour growth with and without competition.

High tree species diversity in tropical forests is driven by reduced interspecific competition relative to intraspecific competition, as a result of the asynchronous timing of tree recruitment permitted by long and stable growing seasons.

Xu et al. examine the effect of leguminous trees on neighbor diversity across 11 plots in tropical forests around the world, and find that in high soil nitrogen conditions, most legume species have higher neighbor diversity than non-legumes, and vice versa where soil nitrogen is low. Their results have practical implications for the utilization of legumes in forest restoration.