SylvanSeeds, a seed germination database for temperate deciduous forests

Abstract

Seed traits have functional significance in all levels of plant biology, but there is a lack of germination databases of wide geographical scope. This report presents SylvanSeeds (https://efernandezpascual.github. io/home/sylvanseeds.html), a first global database of germination records for an ecologically coherent unit: Temperate Broadleaf and Mixed Forests. Data were gathered with a systematic literature search. A list of frequent taxa of the study area was created using 14,963 vegetation relevés from the sPlot database. The list was searched in the Web of Science. 6,791 references were screened, finding 555 articles from which data were extracted. SylvanSeeds includes 4,012 germination records of 334 species from 72 families (gymnosperms and angiosperms), collected in 46 countries between 1920-2017. It provides raw data for meta-analysis: proportions of seeds germinated in laboratory experiments of scarification, stratification, light-darkness, and constant-alternating temperatures. SylvanSeeds is freely distributed as a .csv. A shiny web app is also presented, to make data accessible to the public. SylvanSeeds advances functional seed ecology and brings two innovations to plant science. First, the data-gathering methodology can be extended to other biomes. Second, database and app can be a standard in further efforts to compile germination data.