A catastrophic tropical drought kills hydraulically vulnerable tree species

Jennifer S. Powers; German Vargas G.; Timothy J. Brodribb; Naomi B. Schwartz; Daniel Pérez-Aviles; Chris M. Smith-Martin; Justin M. Becknell; Filippo Aureli; Roger Blanco; Erick Calderón-Morales; Julio C. Calvo-Alvarado; Ana Julieta Calvo-Obando; María Marta Chavarría; Dorian Carvajal-Vanegas; César D. Jiménez-Rodríguez; Evin Murillo Chacon; Colleen M. Schaffner; Leland K. Werden; Xiangtao Xu; David Medvigy

doi:10.1111/gcb.15037

A catastrophic tropical drought kills hydraulically vulnerable tree species

Jennifer S. Powers, German Vargas G., Timothy J. Brodribb, Naomi B. Schwartz, Daniel Pérez-Aviles, Chris M. Smith-Martin, Justin M. Becknell, Filippo Aureli, Roger Blanco, Erick Calderón-Morales, Julio C. Calvo-Alvarado, Ana Julieta Calvo-Obando, María Marta Chavarría, Dorian Carvajal-Vanegas, César D. Jiménez-Rodríguez, Evin Murillo Chacon, Colleen M. Schaffner, Leland K. Werden, Xiangtao Xu, David Medvigy

Ecology, Evolution and Behavior

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

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Abstract

Drought-related tree mortality is now a widespread phenomenon predicted to increase in magnitude with climate change. However, the patterns of which species and trees are most vulnerable to drought, and the underlying mechanisms have remained elusive, in part due to the lack of relevant data and difficulty of predicting the location of catastrophic drought years in advance. We used long-term demographic records and extensive databases of functional traits and distribution patterns to understand the responses of 20–53 species to an extreme drought in a seasonally dry tropical forest in Costa Rica, which occurred during the 2015 El Niño Southern Oscillation event. Overall, species-specific mortality rates during the drought ranged from 0% to 34%, and varied little as a function of tree size. By contrast, hydraulic safety margins correlated well with probability of mortality among species, while morphological or leaf economics spectrum traits did not. This firmly suggests hydraulic traits as targets for future research.

Original language	English (US)
Pages (from-to)	3122-3133
Number of pages	12
Journal	Global change biology
Volume	26
Issue number	5
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.15037
State	Published - May 1 2020

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
We thank the following funding sources for making this work possible: the United States National Science Foundation CAREER grant DEB 1053237, NSF PRFB 1711366, NSF Inter‐American Institute for Global Change Research (IAI) CRN3025, grant number GrantGEO‐128040, the Technological Institute of Costa Rica, ARC DP170100761, Chester Zoo (United Kingdom), National Geographic Society, Consejo Nacional por la Ciencia y la Tecnología (CONACyT, Mexico), and the US Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Biological and Environmental Research, Terrestrial Ecosystem Science (TES) Program (award number DESC0014363).

Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 John Wiley & Sons Ltd

Keywords

extreme drought
hydraulic traits
rainfall seasonality
tree mortality

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

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Powers, J. S., Vargas G., G., Brodribb, T. J., Schwartz, N. B., Pérez-Aviles, D., Smith-Martin, C. M., Becknell, J. M., Aureli, F., Blanco, R., Calderón-Morales, E., Calvo-Alvarado, J. C., Calvo-Obando, A. J., Chavarría, M. M., Carvajal-Vanegas, D., Jiménez-Rodríguez, C. D., Murillo Chacon, E., Schaffner, C. M., Werden, L. K., Xu, X., & Medvigy, D. (2020). A catastrophic tropical drought kills hydraulically vulnerable tree species. Global change biology, 26(5), 3122-3133. https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.15037

Powers, JS, Vargas G., G, Brodribb, TJ, Schwartz, NB, Pérez-Aviles, D, Smith-Martin, CM, Becknell, JM, Aureli, F, Blanco, R, Calderón-Morales, E, Calvo-Alvarado, JC, Calvo-Obando, AJ, Chavarría, MM, Carvajal-Vanegas, D, Jiménez-Rodríguez, CD, Murillo Chacon, E, Schaffner, CM, Werden, LK, Xu, X & Medvigy, D 2020, 'A catastrophic tropical drought kills hydraulically vulnerable tree species', Global change biology, vol. 26, no. 5, pp. 3122-3133. https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.15037

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abstract = "Drought-related tree mortality is now a widespread phenomenon predicted to increase in magnitude with climate change. However, the patterns of which species and trees are most vulnerable to drought, and the underlying mechanisms have remained elusive, in part due to the lack of relevant data and difficulty of predicting the location of catastrophic drought years in advance. We used long-term demographic records and extensive databases of functional traits and distribution patterns to understand the responses of 20–53 species to an extreme drought in a seasonally dry tropical forest in Costa Rica, which occurred during the 2015 El Ni{\~n}o Southern Oscillation event. Overall, species-specific mortality rates during the drought ranged from 0% to 34%, and varied little as a function of tree size. By contrast, hydraulic safety margins correlated well with probability of mortality among species, while morphological or leaf economics spectrum traits did not. This firmly suggests hydraulic traits as targets for future research.",

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AU - Smith-Martin, Chris M.

AU - Becknell, Justin M.

AU - Aureli, Filippo

AU - Blanco, Roger

AU - Calderón-Morales, Erick

AU - Calvo-Alvarado, Julio C.

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N1 - Funding Information: We thank the following funding sources for making this work possible: the United States National Science Foundation CAREER grant DEB 1053237, NSF PRFB 1711366, NSF Inter‐American Institute for Global Change Research (IAI) CRN3025, grant number GrantGEO‐128040, the Technological Institute of Costa Rica, ARC DP170100761, Chester Zoo (United Kingdom), National Geographic Society, Consejo Nacional por la Ciencia y la Tecnología (CONACyT, Mexico), and the US Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Biological and Environmental Research, Terrestrial Ecosystem Science (TES) Program (award number DESC0014363). Publisher Copyright: © 2020 John Wiley & Sons Ltd

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A catastrophic tropical drought kills hydraulically vulnerable tree species

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

UN SDGs

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