Abstract

Background Plant species diversity may be seriously threatened in ecotone zones under global climate change. Therefore, keeping updated inventories of indicator species seems to be a good strategy for monitoring wild areas located in these strips. The database comes from an inventory of climbers and vascular epiphytes conducted in the Cerro Nielol Natural Monument, a small protected area (89 hectares) located in Chile's Mediterranean temperate phytogeographic region, within the boundaries of the city of Temuco, La Araucaina Region. The data represent the update of the first inventory carried out between 1980 and 1984. In this current contribution, data collection was carried out in 27 quadrats using the trails as transects. The data provide the record of 45 species (16 climbers, 15 epiphytes and 10 trees), including two accidental epiphytes (Acer psudoplatanus L. and Gavilea odoratissima (L.) Endl. ex Griseb.), two species that can be found as epiphytes or terricolous (Hymenophyllum tunbrigense (L.) Sm. and Nertera granadensis (Mutis ex L.f.) Druce) and one species (Chusquea quila Kunth) that can be found as terricolous and climber. Species of interest were recorded on live trees (n = 51), snags (n = 9), stumps (n = 4), fallen log (n = 5) and on the forest soil (n = 17). The most abundant climbers were Hydrangea serratifolia (Hook. Arn.) F. Phil. (n = 77 stems), Lapageria rosea Ruiz Pav. (n = 70 stems), Raukaua valdiviensis (Gay) Frodin (n = 48 stems) and Cissus striata Ruiz Pav. (n = 33 stems). In contrast, the most abundant epiphytes were Hymenophyllum plicatum Kaulf. (n = 1728 fronds) and Hymenophyllum tunbrigense (L.) Sm. (n = 2375 fronds). These latter two species represent the highest frequency and abundance in the whole inventory, respectively. Several ecosystem traits are, in fact, new reports since the first inventory was conducted in 1980-1984; for example, the presence of the filmy fern Hymenophyllum tunbrigense, the record of the climber Elytropus chilensis , fallen logs or the species-host relationship. Accordingly, the database is made available in this manuscript.