BAYESIAN UPDATING OF THE FRUITING BIOLOGY OF DIOSPYROS MESPILIFORMIS HOCHST. EX A. DC IN REPUBLIC OF BENIN

Fruiting and recruitment of trees are respectively dysregulating and declining throughout Afrotropical forests. The main objective of this research was to accurately estimate with robust methods of statistics inference the fruiting potential and spatial pattern of recruitment of the populations of the neglected wild edible fruit trees. The specific objectives were to (i) assess in the Bayesian framework the fruiting biology of D. mespiliformis Hochst. Ex A. DC following latitudinal gradient in republic of Benin and (ii) analyze the spatial pattern of the recruitment of D. mespiliformis surrounding the mother trees. Thirty and fifty-eight fruiting mother trees of D. mespiliformis were randomly selected respectively at the lowest and the highest latitudes. Number of fruits per tree, diameter at the breast height, height and crown areas were collected. Total number of the individuals of recruitments of D. mespiliformis were recorded in the successive 5 m radius annulus surrounding mother trees. Overall, D. mespiliformis fruiting was higher at the highest latitudes (2708 fruits / tree) than at the lowest latitudes’ vegetation ecosystems (247 fruits / tree). Markov Chain Monte Carlo resampling revealed contradictory trend. The main biotic driver for the highest fruits production is the height of D. mespiliformis at the highest latitudes while width crown area increases fruiting at the lowest latitudes. The populations of D. mespiliformis at the lowest latitudes produced the fleshiest endocarp fruits with the largest seeds at the opposite to the highest latitudes’ populations that produced the longest and largest fruits. The spatial pattern of the recruitment was clumped in the radius of 5 m surrounding the mother trees (Dx ˃ 1 stem / m2 ). Future researches have to address nutritional and breeding values of D. mespiliformis.