Seed dispersal by greater one-horned rhinoceros (Rhinoceros unicornis) and the flora of Rhinoceros latrines

Rhinoceros unicornis in Royal Chitwan National Park, Nepal ingested the fruits of at least 23 species of herbaceous and woody plants. Seeds manured into grassland latrines used by Rhinoceros yielded distinct floras of dicotyledonous plants in flood plain grassland associations. Trewia nudiflora, the most common riverine forest tree in Chitwan and Cassia tora, a weedy herb, accounted for most of the plant cover. A survey of the woody flora of Chitwan revealed that < 10 % of plants are dispersed by large mammals but large-mammal dispersed species represented the most common trees in flood plain forest and savannah associations.