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1. Masting, the production of large seed crops at intervals of several years, is a reproductive adaptation displayed by many tree species. The predator satiation hypothesis predicts that starvation of seed predators between mast years and satiation during mast years decreases seed predation and thus enhances tree regeneration.

2. Mast fruiting comes at demographic costs such as missed reproduction opportunities and increased density‐dependence of recruits, but it remains unknown if predator satiation constitutes a sufficiently large benefit for masting to evolve as a viable life‐history strategy. So far, no studies have quantified the net fitness consequences of masting.

3. Using a long‐term demographic data set of the dipterocarp Shorea leprosula in a Malaysian forest, we constructed stochastic matrix population models and performed a demographic cost–benefit analysis.

4. For observed values of mast …