Today, mid- and high-elevation belts in the American Tropics still support montane evergreen broad-leaved oak (Quercus) forests.They range from r- atively dry woodlands to extremely wet cloud forests,and may occur either as pure monotypic stands ¿ sometimes with giant oaks up to 60 m tall ¿ or as mixed-species systems in which oak co-occurs with other predominant g- era such as pine (Pinus) and sweetgum (Liquidambar). They are found throughout southern Mexico, Central America and the Colombian Andes,and form a major component of the American Tropics ecoregions, biodiversity hotspots,and centers of plant diversity. Their biological richness, expressed in the large variety of trees, shrubs, epiphytic orchids and bromeliads, ferns, bryophytes, lichens and fungi, is indeed striking. Even animal life is astonishing: the avifauna is among the greatest worldwide,with the mythical Resplendent Quetzal as its most beau- ful representative. Large mammals such as jaguar, puma, tapir, peccary and deer still roam around in considerable quantities.In terms of biogeochemical cycling,most of these forests,and especially the oak cloud forests filter large air masses.They capture and incorporate water and nutrients from mist and fog into their cycles,providing nascent rivers with clear fresh water. Originally, these montane oak forests were widely distributed. However, since the early 1800s,large oak forest areas in the highland Neotropics have made way for coffee plantations and pastures. Today,only few intact blocks remain while most forests are fragmented,suffering from severe disturbance.

Part I Introduction to Neotropical montane oak forests 1. Global and Neotropical distribution and diversity of oak (genus Quercus) and oak forests Kevin C. Nixon Part II Paleo-ecology and biogeography 2. Immigration of oak into northern South America: a paleo-ecological document Henry Hooghiemstra 3. Effects of the Younger Dryas cooling event on Late Quaternary montane oak forest in Costa Rica Gerald A. Islebe and Henry Hooghiemstra 4. Altitudinal zonation of montane oak forests along climate and soil gradients in Costa Rica Maarten Kappelle and Jan-Gerrit van Uffelen 5. Saprotrophic and ectomycorrhizal macrofungi of Costa Rican oak forests Gregory M. Mueller, Roy E. Halling, Julieta Carranza, Milagro Mata, and John P. Schmit 6. Diversity and biogeography of lichens in neotropical montane oak forests Harrie J. M. Sipman 7. Epiphytic communities of bryophytes and macrolichens in a Costa Rican montane oak forest Ingo Holz Part III Stand structure and composition 8. Composition and structure of humid montane oak forests at different sites in central and eastern Mexico Isolda Luna Vega, Othón Alcántara Ayala, Carlos Alberto Ruiz-Jiménez, and Raúl Contreras-Medina 9. Oak forests of the hyper-humid region of La Chinantla, northern Oaxaca Range, Mexico Jorge A. Meave, Armando Rincón and Marco A. Romero-Romero 10. Structure and composition of Costa Rican montane oak forests Maarten Kappelle 11. Structure and composition of Colombian montane oak forests María T. Pulido, Jaime Cavelier, and Sandra P. Cortés Part IV Population dynamics 12. Regeneration and population dynamics of Quercus rugosa at the Ajusco Volcano, Mexico Consuelo Bonfil 13. Ecology of acorn dispersalby small mammals in montane forests of Chiapas, Mexico Fabiola López Barrera and Robert H. Manson 14. Establishment, survival and growth of tree seedlings under successional montane oak forests in Chiapas, Mexico Neptalí Ramírez-Marcial, Angélica Camacho-Cruz, Mario González-Espinosa, and Fabiola López-Barrera 15. Population structures of two understory plant species along an altitudinal gradient in Costa Rican montane oak forests Thomas V.M. Groot, Marc Stift, J. Gerard B. Oostermeijer, Antoine M. Cleef, and Maarten Kappelle Part V Ecosystem disturbance and regeneration 16. Secondary Succession in montane pine-oak forests of Chiapas, Mexico Mario González-Espinosa, Neptalí Ramírez-Marcial, and Luis Galindo-Jaimes 17. Changes in diversity and structure along a successional gradient in a Costa Rican montane oak forest Maarten Kappelle 18. Regeneration dynamics in a Costa Rican montane oak forest after reduced-impact logging Manuel R. Guariguata, Grace P. Sáenz, and Lucio Pedroni 19. Growth and physiological responses of oak, pine and shrub seedlings to edge gradients in a fragmented Mexican montane oak forest Heidi Asbjornsen, K.A. Vogt, and P.M.S. Ashton 20. Morphological variations of gall-forming insects on different species of oaks (Quercus) in Mexico Ken Oyama, C. Scareli-Santos, M.L. Mondragón-Sánchez, E. Tovar-Sánchez, and P. Cuevas-Reyes 21. Above-ground water and nutrient fluxes in three successional stages of Costa Rican montane oak forest with contrasting epiphyte abundance Lars Köhler, Dirk Hölscher, and Christoph Leuschner 22. Changes in fine root system size and structure during secondary succession in a Costa Rican montane oak forest Dietrich Hertel, Dirk Hölscher, Lars Köhler, and Christoph Leuschner 23. Soil seed bank changes along a forest