Chronic warming and dry soils limit carbon uptake and growth despite a longer growing season in beech and oak.

ABSTRACT: Progressively warmer and drier climatic conditions impact tree phenology and carbon cycling with large consequences for forest carbon balance. However, it remains unclear how individual impacts of warming and drier soils differ from their combined effects and how species interactions modulate tree responses. Using mesocosms, we assessed the multiyear impact of continuous air warming and lower soil moisture alone or in combination on phenology, leaf-level photosynthesis, nonstructural carbohydrate concentrations, and aboveground growth of young European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) and Downy oak (Quercus pubescens Willd.) trees. We further tested how species interactions (in monocultures and in mixtures) modulated these effects. Warming prolonged the growing season of both species but reduced

SUBMITTER: Didion-Gency M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10828195 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature