Warming, plant phenology and the spatial dimension of trophic mismatch for large herbivores

Post, Eric; Pedersen, Christian; Wilmers, Christopher C.; Forchhammer, Mads C.

doi:10.1098/rspb.2008.0463

Cited by 160 publications

(136 citation statements)

References 44 publications

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“…During the growing season, concurrent growth and flowering across the landscape could alter species interactions, increasing competition for limiting resources and pollinators and changing landscape-scale gene flow via pollination. Decreased spatial variation in plant phenology can also reduce foraging success by large herbivores with consequences for offspring production (43). Thus, the atmospheric transport of desert dust is a process that links human activities in desert ecosystems (7) to changes in phenology in alpine landscapes, which could affect biotic interactions and nutrient cycling by synchronizing phenology across the tundra.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Biological consequences of earlier snowmelt from desert dust deposition in alpine landscapes

Steltzer

Landry

Painter

et al. 2009

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Dust deposition to mountain snow cover, which has increased since the late 19 th century, accelerates the rate of snowmelt by increasing the solar radiation absorbed by the snowpack. Snowmelt occurs earlier, but is decoupled from seasonal warming. Climate warming advances the timing of snowmelt and early season phenological events (e.g., the onset of greening and flowering); however, earlier snowmelt without warmer temperatures may have a different effect on phenology. Here, we report the results of a set of snowmelt manipulations in which radiationabsorbing fabric and the addition and removal of dust from the surface of the snowpack advanced or delayed snowmelt in the alpine tundra. These changes in the timing of snowmelt were superimposed on a system where the timing of snowmelt varies with topography and has been affected by increased dust loading. At the community level, phenology exhibited a threshold response to the timing of snowmelt. Greening and flowering were delayed before seasonal warming, after which there was a linear relationship between the date of snowmelt and the timing of phenological events. Consequently, the effects of earlier snowmelt on phenology differed in relation to topography, which resulted in increasing synchronicity in phenology across the alpine landscape with increasingly earlier snowmelt. The consequences of earlier snowmelt from increased dust deposition differ from climate warming and include delayed phenology, leading to synchronized growth and flowering across the landscape and the opportunity for altered species interactions, landscape-scale gene flow via pollination, and nutrient cycling.climate warming ͉ phenology ͉ plant life history ͉ synchronization ͉ threshold T he transfer of dust from arid and semiarid lands to snowcovered landscapes takes place around the world (1-3). While this process has occurred historically, the increasing area of arid lands and the utilization of these lands by expanding human populations have increased dust loads (4-6). For example, during settlement of the western U.S., the intensification of human activities such as agriculture, grazing, and resource exploration in semiarid landscapes led to 500% greater dust deposition in the adjacent mountains (7). Furthermore, dust deposition in many regions could increase as a result of the increasing extent of arid lands and greater human activity in these areas (8). Dust deposited in winter and spring decreases the albedo of the snow surface at the time it is deposited and again, when the buried dust layers reemerge during spring snowmelt. Through this change in surface energy exchange, dust can advance the timing of snowmelt by more than a month (9).Seasonal snow cover has a substantial effect on ecosystem function where freezing temperatures over winter facilitate the formation and retention of a snowpack (10-12). It protects and sustains plant and soil communities by moderating temperatures during winter and later by supplying a source of water to fuel plant growth at the start of the growing seas...

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Biological consequences of earlier snowmelt from desert dust deposition in alpine landscapes

Steltzer

Landry

Painter

et al. 2009

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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“…Global warming is triggering changes in plant phenology [1][2][3][4][5][6][7] and it is feared that these changes may precipitate devastating changes in animal distribution (e.g., pests), alter the synchronization between species, and have feedback effects on the climate system through the alteration of biogeochemical and physical processes of vegetated land surface [8,9]. However, despite these conceivable but alarming consequences, we do not know where in space and time most intense phenological changes are happening.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Trends in Spring Phenology of Western European Deciduous Forests

et al. 2013

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Plant phenology is changing because of recent global warming, and this change may precipitate changes in animal distribution (e.g., pests), alter the synchronization between species, and have feedback effects on the climate system through the alteration of biogeochemical and physical processes of vegetated land surface. Here, ground observations (leaf unfolding/first leaf separation of six deciduous tree species) and satellite-derived start-of-growing season (SOS) are used to assess how the timing of leafing/SOS in Western European deciduous forest responded to climate variability between 2001 and 2011 and evaluate the reliability of satellite SOS estimates in tracking the response of forest leafing to climate variability in this area. Satellite SOS estimates are derived from the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) time series of the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS). Temporal trends in the SOS are quantified using linear regression, expressing SOS as a function of time. We demonstrated that the growing season was starting earlier between 2001 and 2011 for the majority of temperate deciduous forests in Western Europe, possibly influenced by regional spring warming effects experienced during the same period. A significant shift of up to 3 weeks to early leafing was found in both ground observations and satellite SOS estimates. We also show that the magnitude and trajectory of shifts in satellite SOS estimates are well comparable to that of in situ observations, hence highlighting the importance of satellite imagery in monitoring leaf phenology under a changing climate.

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“…Synchrony in reproduction can improve chances of mate-finding (Augspurger 1981;Reed et al 2009) and offspring survival (Ims 1990;Kelly & Sork 2002), but it also increases competition for resources. Less obviously, decreased variance in phenology at one trophic level can affect higher trophic levels, which may depend on the food supply being more evenly distributed in time-that is, having higher among-individual or among-plot variability in phenological events (Post et al 2008). Changes in population and communitylevel synchrony in response to warming temperatures are worth monitoring because of these potential effects on demography and ecosystem processes .…”

Section: Characterizing Phenologies At the Population Levelmentioning

confidence: 99%

Toward a synthetic understanding of the role of phenology in ecology and evolution

Forrest

Miller‐Rushing

2010

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

571

525

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Phenology affects nearly all aspects of ecology and evolution. Virtually all biological phenomenafrom individual physiology to interspecific relationships to global nutrient fluxes-have annual cycles and are influenced by the timing of abiotic events. Recent years have seen a surge of interest in this topic, as an increasing number of studies document phenological responses to climate change. Much recent research has addressed the genetic controls on phenology, modelling techniques and ecosystem-level and evolutionary consequences of phenological change. To date, however, these efforts have tended to proceed independently. Here, we bring together some of these disparate lines of inquiry to clarify vocabulary, facilitate comparisons among habitat types and promote the integration of ideas and methodologies across different disciplines and scales. We discuss the relationship between phenology and life history, the distinction between organismal-and population-level perspectives on phenology and the influence of phenology on evolutionary processes, communities and ecosystems. Future work should focus on linking ecological and physiological aspects of phenology, understanding the demographic effects of phenological change and explicitly accounting for seasonality and phenology in forecasts of ecological and evolutionary responses to climate change.

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Warming, plant phenology and the spatial dimension of trophic mismatch for large herbivores

Cited by 160 publications

References 44 publications

Biological consequences of earlier snowmelt from desert dust deposition in alpine landscapes

Biological consequences of earlier snowmelt from desert dust deposition in alpine landscapes

Trends in Spring Phenology of Western European Deciduous Forests

Toward a synthetic understanding of the role of phenology in ecology and evolution

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