Ficus Maxima - Ecology

Ecology

Figs are sometimes considered to be potential keystone species for communities of fruit-eating animals; their asynchronous fruiting patterns may cause them to be important fruit sources when other food sources are scarce. At Tinigua National Park in Colombia Ficus maxima was an important fruit producer during periods of fruit scarcity in one of three years. This led Colombian ecologist Pablo Stevens to consider it a possible keystone species, but he decided against including it in his final list of potential keystone species at the site.

Ficus maxima fruit are consumed by birds and mammals. These animals act as seed dispersers when the defaecate or regurgitate intact seeds, or when they drop fruit below the parent tree. In Panama, F. maxima fruit were reported to have relatively high levels of protein and low levels of water-soluble carbohydrates in a study of Ficus fruit consumed by bats.

Black howler monkeys in Belize consume fruit and young and mature leaves of F. maxima. In southern Veracruz, Mexico, F. maxima was the third most important food source for a studied population of Mexican howler monkeys; they consumed young leaves, mature leaves, mature fruit and petioles. Venezuelan red howlers were observed feeding F. maxima fruit in Colombia.

The interaction between figs and fig wasps is especially well-known (see section on reproduction, above). In addition to their pollinators, Ficus species are exploited by a group of non-pollinating chalcidoid wasps whose larvae develop in its figs. Both pollinating and non-pollinating wasps serve as hosts for parasitoid wasps. In addition to T. americanus, F. maxima figs from Brazil were found to contain non-pollinating wasps belonging to the genus Critogaster, mites, ants, beetles, and dipteran and lepidopteran larvae. Norwegian biologist Frode Ødegaard recorded a total of 78 phytophagous (plant-eating) insect species on a single F. maxima tree in Panamanian dry forest—59 wood eating insects, 12 which fed on green plant parts, and 7 flower visitors. It supported the fourth most specialised phytophagous insect fauna and the second largest wood-feeding insect fauna among the 24 tree species sampled.