Our second aim was to quantify the cross-species relationship
between plant height and dispersal distance. Plant height is
another important trait for species’ life-history strategies,
affecting species’ abilities to capture light (Falster & Westoby
2005). Tall species tend to have higher annual seed production,
larger seeds, greater longevity and greater reproductive
lifespans than do short species (Moles & Leishman 2008). However,
tall species take longer to reach maturity (Moles & Leishman
2008). Taller species presumably release seeds at greater
heights than do shorter species, and for wind-dispersed species,
greater release heights result in increased dispersal distances
(Tackenberg, Poschlod & Bonn 2003; Soons et al. 2004; Travis,
Smith & Ranwala 2010). Beyond wind-dispersed species, the
relationship between plant height and dispersal distance is largely
unknown, although there was a positive relationship
between plant height and mean dispersal distance for 41 tropical
tree species (Muller-Landau et al. 2008). If taller plants have
wider crowns than shorter species (King 1990), then seeds
released at the crown edge would disperse further from the parent
plant base for tall species (Muller-Landau et al. 2008). We
therefore predicted that seeds from taller species would disperse
further than would seeds from shorter species