Anomalous temperature-growth response of Abies faxoniana to sustained freezing stress along elevational gradients in China's Western Sichuan Province

作者：Li, Zong Shan; Liu, Guo Hua^*; Fu, Bo Jie; Hu, Chan Juan; Luo, Shu Zheng; Liu, Xing Liang; He, Fei

来源：Trees - Structure and Function, 2012, 26(4): 1373-1388.

DOI：10.1007/s00468-012-0712-9

• Abies faxoniana
• Tree-ring
• Dendroclimatology
• Elevation gradient
• Western Sichuan

A network of ten Faxon fir tree-ring width chronologies was constructed from sites ranging in elevation from 3,000 to 3,450 m in the Wolong Natural Reserve in Western Sichuan Province, China. The site chronologies display significant inter-site correlations (mean R = 0.647, p < 0.001) and the first principal component (PC1) accounts for 68.32 % of the total variation of the chronologies, implying a high degree of similarity in growth variation among the elevation gradients. Correlation analysis using monthly climate data indicates that the radial growth response of Faxon fir along the elevation gradients is markedly similar to common climatic signals, such as sunshine duration (positive) and cloud cover (negative), from January to March. Thus, it appears that winter freezing stress, which is caused by low solar radiation and high cloudiness, is the major environmental factor regulating the growth of trees across the elevational gradients. In addition, the site chronologies have no elevation-dependent growth responses to temperature or precipitation. Irrespective of the elevational differences of the sample sites, an anomalous reduction in radial growth occurred consistently since the 1960s, diverging from the instrumental temperature records since the 1990s. The cause of this divergence may be ascribed to the recent accelerated winter freezing stress and its role in controlling radial growth.

• 出版日期2012-8
• 单位城市和区域生态国家重点实验室; 中国科学院