Growth plasticity of conifers did not avoid declining resilience to soil and atmospheric droughts during the 20th century

Background:Plasticity in response to environmental drivers can help trees cope with droughts.However,our understanding of the importance of plasticity and physiological adjustments in trees under global change is limited.Methods:We used the International Tree-Ring Data Bank(ITRDB)to examine 20th century growth responses in conifer trees during(resistance)and following(resilience)years of severe soil and atmospheric droughts occurring in isolation or as compound events.Growth resilience indices were calculated using observed growth divided by expected growth to avoid spurious correlations,in which the expected values were obtained by the autoregressive moving average(ARIMA)model.We used high atmospheric vapour pressure deficit(VPD)to select years of atmospheric drought and low annual values of the Standardized Precipitation-Evapotranspiration Index(SPEI)to select years with soil drought.We acquired the sensitivities(i.e.,the slopes of the relationships)by fitting the resilience indices as a function of environmental drivers,and assessed how these sensitivities changed over time for different types of drought events using linear mixed models.We also checked whether plasticity in growth responses was sufficient to prevent long-term trends of growth reductions during or after severe droughts.We acknowledge that by focusing on the response of surviving trees from the ITRDB we are potentially biasing our results towards higher resilience,as stand level responses(e.g.,mortality)may result in lowered competition after the disturbance event.Results:Sensitivities of resilience to VPD and SPEI changed throughout the 20th century,with the directions of these changes often reversing in the second half of the century.For the 1961–2010 period,changing sensitivities had positive effects on resilience,especially following years of high-VPD and compound events,avoiding growth losses that would have occurred if sensitivities had remained constant.Despite sensitivity changes,resilience was still lower at the end of the 20th century compared to the beginning of the century.Conclusions:Future adjustments to low-SPEI and high-VPD events are likely to continue to compensate for the trends in climate only partially,leading to further generalized reductions in tree growth of conifers.An improved understanding of these plastic adjustments and their limits,as well as potential compensatory processes at the stand level,is needed to project forest responses to climate change.

Ecosystem carbon storage and sink/source of temperate forested wetlands in Xiaoxing’anling, northeast China

Wetlands play an important role in the global carbon cycle, but there are still considerable uncertainties in the estimation of wetland carbon storage and a dispute on whether wetlands are carbon sources or carbon sinks. Xiaoxing’anling are one of several concentrated distribution areas of forested wetland in China, but the carbon storage and carbon sink/source of forested wetlands in this area is unclear. We measured the ecosystem carbon storage (vegetation and soil), annual net carbon sequestration of vegetation and annual carbon emissions of soil heterotrophic respiration of five typical forested wetland types (alder swamp, white birch swamp, larch swamp, larch fen, and larch bog) distributed along a moisture gradient in this area in order to reveal the spatial variations of their carbon storage and quantitatively evaluate their position as carbon sink or source according to the net carbon balance of the ecosystems. The results show that the larch fen had high carbon storage (448.8 t ha^(−1)) (6.8% higher than the larch bog and 10.5–30.1% significantly higher than other three wetlands (P < 0.05), the white birch swamp and larch bog were medium carbon storage ecosystems (406.3 and 420.1 t ha^(−1)) (12.4–21.8% significantly higher than the other two types (P < 0.0 5), while the alder swamp and larch swamp were low in carbon storage (345.0 and 361.5 t ha^(−1), respectively). The carbon pools of the five wetlands were dominated by their soil carbon pools (88.5–94.5%), and the vegetation carbon pool was secondary (5.5–11.5%). At the same time, their ecosystem net carbon balances were positive (0.1–0.6 t ha^(−1) a^(−1)) because the annual net carbon sequestration of vegetation (4.0–4.5 t ha^(−1) a^(−1)) were higher than the annual carbon emissions of soil heterotrophic respiration (CO_(2) and CH_(4)) (3.8–4.4 t ha^(−1) a^(−1)) in four wetlands, (the alder swamp being the exception), so all four were carbon sinks while only the alder swamp was a source of carbon emissions (− 2.1 t ha^(−1) a^(−1)) due to a degraded tree layer. Our results demonstrate that these forested wetlands were generally carbon sinks in the Xiaoxing’anling, and there was obvious spatial variation in carbon storage of ecosystems along the moisture gradient.

Photosynthesis adaption in Korean pine to gap size and position within Populus davidiana forests in Xiaoxing’anling, China

Forest gaps restrict the restoration of temperate secondary forest to broad-leaved Korean pine forest in zonal climax vegetation by affecting the growth of Korean pine(Pinus koraiensis).However,the photo synthetic adaptability of Korean pine to gap size and position within the gap is unclear.In order to explore the adaptability of young Korean pine(35 years) to different gap sizes in Xiaoxing’anling,photo synthetic capacity and microenvironmental factors(leaf temperature,light transmittance) of Korean pine needles in three positions in the gap(central,transition,and edge areas) were investigated.Three gaps were identified in the secondary Populus davidiana forest:a large 201 m^(2) gap,a middle 112 m^(2) gap,and a small 50 m^(2) gap;12 m^(2) of the understory was sampled as a control.The results show that:(1) maximum net photosynthetic rate(P_(max)) in needles of Korean pine growing in the large gap was higher than in the small gap,and P_(max) in the centre in the same gap was higher than in the transition and edge areas;(2) light saturation point(LSP) and photosynthetic quantum yield(AQY)of needles in the large gap were higher than in the small gap,while the light compensation point(LCP) and chlorophyll contents of needles were lower in the small gap;and,(3)P_(max) had a significant positive correlation with temperature and light transmittance.It is suggested that the larger the gap in secondary Populus davidiana forests,the greater the change in light intensity and temperatures,the stronger the light adaption of Korean pine needles and the higher the photosynthetic capacity.Therefore,in the recovery of broadleaved/Korean pine forests,suitable gaps should be created and gap microhabitats fully utilized to accelerate the restoration process.

Short-term effects of fire disturbance on CH4 emission from forested wetlands in the Xiaoxing’an Mountains, Northeast China

Using static chamber gas chromatography, we determined the seasonal dynamics, controlling factors, and distribution patterns of forest swamp CH4 levels and related environmental factors (temperature, water level) after fire disturbance in the Xiaoxing’an Mountains. The results showed the following: during the growing season, the annual CH4 emission distribution ranged from - 0.001 ± 0.012 to 22.373 ± 3.650 mg m^-2 h^-1;mild fire caused the swamp CH4 emission flux of tussock, shrub, Alnus sibirica and birch swamp to increase by 56.0–524.7%;at low water levels, temperature had a significant influence on the swamp type, and the correlation between the methane emission flux and temperature was significantly strengthened;after a fire disturbance, methane emissions from all types of marsh were highest in summer and second highest in autumn, with a weak absorption in spring;and along the water environment gradient of the transition zone, the CH4 emission flux presented a decreasing trend in its spatial distribution pattern.

Long-time precipitation reduction and nitrogen deposition increase alter soil nitrogen dynamic by influencing soil bacterial communities and functional groups

The effects of precipitation reduction and nitrogen deposition increase on soil bacterial communities and functions impact soil nitrogen cycling. Seasonal changes could modify the effects of precipitation reduction and nitrogen deposition increase on bacterial communities and functions by changing soil environments and properties. Understanding soil microbial communities and the seasonal response of functions to precipitation reduction and nitrogen deposition increase may be important for the accurate prediction of changes in the soil nitrogen dynamics. Thus, a long-term field simulation experiment of nitrogen deposition increase and throughfall exclusion was established to investigate soil bacterial communities’ response to nitrogen deposition increase and/or precipitation reduction, with no nitrogen deposition increase and no precipation reduction as a control, in a temperate forest. We examined soil bacterial communities(Illumina sequencing) under different treatments during the winter, freezing-thawing cycle periods(FTCs), and growing season. The bacterial functional groups were predicted by the FAPROTAX database. The results showed that nitrogen deposition increase, precipitation reduction, the combined effect of nitrogen deposition increase and precipitation reduction, and seasonal changes significantly altered the soil bacterial community composition.Interestingly, by combining the result of a previous study in which nitrogen deposition increase increased the nitrous oxide flux in the same experimental system, the loss of soil nitrogen was increased by the decrease in denitrification and increase of nitrification bacteria under nitrogen deposition increase,while ammonification bacteria significantly increased and N-fixing bacteria significantly decreased with precipitation reduction compared to the control. In relation to seasonal changes, the aromatic-degrading, cellulolytic, and ureolytic bacteria were lowest during FTCs, which indicated that FTCs might inhibit biodegradation. Nitrification and nitrite-oxidizing bacteria increased with nitrogen deposition increase or precipitation reduction and in FTCs compared to the control or other seasons. The interaction between treatment and season significantly changed the soil bacterial communities and functions. These results highlight that nitrogen deposition increase, precipitation reduction, seasonal changes, and their interactions might directly alter bacterial communities and indirectly alter the dynamics of soil N.