Transient Effects of Snow Cover Duration on Primary Growth and Leaf Traits in a Tundra Shrub.

ABSTRACT: With the recent climate warming, tundra ecotones are facing a progressive acceleration of spring snowpack melting and extension of the growing season, with evident consequences to vegetation. Along with summer temperature, winter precipitation has been recently recognised as a crucial factor for tundra shrub growth and physiology. However, gaps of knowledge still exist on long-living plant responses to different snowpack duration, especially on how intra-specific and year-to-year variability together with multiple functional trait adjustments could influence the long-term responses. To fill this gap, we conducted a 3 years snow manipulation experiment above the Alpine treeline on the typical tundra species Juniperus communis, the conifer with the widest distributional range in the n

SUBMITTER: Unterholzner L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9037292 | biostudies-literature | 2022

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature