65) and was higher in plantations in three out of the five cases reported (Fig. 3). In one case exotic Selleck AMN-107 species richness was unaffected by plantation establishment; in the one case where exotic species richness was higher in the primary forest than plantation, the abundance of exotic species was lower in the primary forest (Goldman et al. 2008). Moreover, in this case, native species richness and overall species richness decreased with plantation establishment,

indicating a much more abundant and diverse native understory in primary forests compared to plantations. In contrast, species richness significantly increased in the secondary forest to plantation category (P < 0.05; Table 1; Fig. 2), despite considerable heterogeneity among results, with plantations being less species rich C646 cost than secondary forests in 18 of the 54 cases. Non-native species richness was reported in two cases in the secondary forest to plantation category P505-15 mw (Fig. 3). One was a group of plantations that used native species where exotic species richness increased by approximately 5% (data estimated from figure) (Battles et al. 2001). The other was an exotic species plantation, which reported one non-native species in the plantation compared to none in the paired secondary forest (a 100% increase) while native species richness declined 17% (the one case reporting

native species richness in the secondary forest to plantation category) with plantation establishment (Cremene et al. 2005). Narrow/endemic/specialist species richness increased 12% (±27%) overall, but was highly variable

and swayed by one case where narrow/endemic/specialist species richness increased by 144% (Cremene et al. 2005), whereas, four out of six cases resulted in a decrease in narrow/endemic/specialist species. Exotic or degraded pasture to plantation Species richness in plantations established on exotic or degraded pasture increased in 13 of 22 cases, but Methane monooxygenase the mean increase of 25% (±15%) was not significant (P = 0.83) (Fig. 2; Table 1). Exotic species richness significantly decreased by 39% (P < 0.05; n = 6), while native species richness increased by 410% (P = 0.11; Fig. 3). Species richness in plantations utilizing native species increased an average of 45% (n = 14) while in plantations utilizing non-native species, species richness decreased overall by 12% (n = 8), although neither of these was significant. It should be noted that several publications finding large increases in woody species richness in both exotic and native plantations established on degraded or exotic pastures (Parrotta 1995; Cusack and Montagnini 2004) were excluded because they did not include herbaceous species richness, but do indicate the high capacity of plantations to restore woody diversity, which is sometimes the goal of plantation establishment (both native and exotic) on degraded lands. Effects of plantation species We found a highly significant (P < 0.