Species studied
The three species studied belong to the genus Myrcia , family Myrtaceae, subfamily Myrtoideae. Myrtaceae presents the highest number of species in tropical rainforests (Oliveira-Filho and Fontes, 2000) and is considered a characteristic family in the Brazilian Atlantic coastal forest (Lucas and Bünger, 2015). In the study plot, there are 21 Myrtaceae species, seven belonging to Myrcia (Joly et al. , 2012). The three species studied have 50 or more individuals in the plot (individuals with stem diameter at breast height ≥ 4.8 cm; data from the Functional Gradient Project Biota/FAPESP 03/12595-7 – available upon request).
The three species are not geographically restricted to therestinga forest and are widely distributed in the Atlantic Forest (Fig. 1). In the study plot, they occupy different canopy strata.Myrcia brasiliensis occupies the first stratum and also occurs as an emergent tree; M. multiflora occupies the first and second strata, and M. racemosa occupies the first stratum (Pedroni, 2001). The three species increase water capitation in the soil at 50 cm depth and reduce the use of topsoil water (10 cm depth) from the flooded to the dry period. In the dry period, the species show a similar use of water sources, but M. racemosa capitates a higher proportion of water at 30-cm depth (Antunes, 2018). The similar water use suggests that the three Myrcia species are restricted to similar environments in the periodically flooded restinga forest studied here, but we lack knowledge on other traits to hypothesize whether the species present similar niches.