As the most remote archipelago in the world, the Hawaiian Islands are home to a highly
endemic and disharmonic biota that has fascinated biologists for centuries. Forests are the
dominant terrestrial biome in Hawai 'i, spanning complex, heterogeneous climates across
substrates that vary tremendously in age, soil structure, and nutrient availability. Species
richness is low in Hawaiian forests compared to other tropical forests, as a consequence of
dispersal limitation from continents and adaptive radiations in only some lineages, and …