ABSTRACT Seed dispersal by wind regulates plant species distribution in natural vegetation and can be applied in forest management and aerodynamic engineering. The terminal velocity of seeds is a fundamental variable for predicting anemochory seed dispersal, but data availability and the effect of appendages remain unexplored. This meta‐analysis integrated terminal velocity records for 1479 species from LEDA Traitbase and 56 literatures, explored descriptive patterns, and tested the effects of morphological traits. The dataset was categorized by seed dispersal vector (e.g., gravity, animal, wind) and appendage type (appendage‐less, hair, wing). Regression models predicting terminal velocity were developed using seed mass or mass‐to‐area ratio. The mean terminal velocity was 1.42 m s −1 for woody plants and 2.22 m s −1 for herbaceous plants, with variation across taxonomic groups. Notable intra‐family heterogeneity was observed where different appendage types coexisted. Terminal velocity was the greatest for rib‐winged (2.56 m s −1 ) and the lowest for pappus (1.11 m s −1 ) and one‐winged (1.34 m s −1 ) among appendage types. The presence of wing or pappus appendages reduced terminal velocity and weakened the mass–terminal velocity relationship. This meta‐analysis is the first attempt to produce an integrated regression model predicting terminal velocity by gathering all available datasets of seed mass, area, and terminal velocity. This study provides robust evidences supporting the reduced terminal velocity depending on the area of wing or pappus appendages. These representative terminal velocity values by taxa, seed dispersal vector, and seed appendage type, will aid in evaluating anemochory seed dispersal capacity. However, the availability of terminal velocity data needs to be improved.
Lee et al. (Sun,) studied this question.