Tale of Two Grevilleas - How do Rainforest and Savanna Tree Species differ?

As climate change and other ecological disturbances become more unpredictable, it is causing an unprecedented amount of stress on regions such as the rainforest and savanna in the Wet Tropics of Queensland, Australia. To understand the effects on these regions, it is crucial to understand how individual species have uniquely adapted to climatic disturbances. To do so, we measured adaptive traits in congeneric or closely related species residing in both the rainforest and savanna. Grevillea baileyana, found in the rainforest, and Grevillea glauca, found in the savanna. By looking at two closely related species, we can understand how functional traits adapt to their environment. We looked at 21 different traits in categories such as leaf, stem, anatomical, and flammability variables.