Leading‐edge disequilibrium in alder and spruce populations across the forest–tundra ecotone
| Autor: | Trevor C. Lantz, Hana Z. Travers-Smith |
|---|---|
| Rok vydání: | 2020 |
| Předmět: |
treeline
0106 biological sciences Leading edge 010504 meteorology & atmospheric sciences Disequilibrium Climate change 010603 evolutionary biology 01 natural sciences Alder Sub arctic lcsh:QH540-549.5 medicine Ecology Evolution Behavior and Systematics 0105 earth and related environmental sciences Ecology biology air photographs shrubline spatial pattern sub‐Arctic Ecotone 15. Life on land biology.organism_classification Tundra 13. Climate action range limits Common spatial pattern Environmental science sense organs lcsh:Ecology medicine.symptom |
| Zdroj: | Ecosphere, Vol 11, Iss 7, Pp n/a-n/a (2020) |
| ISSN: | 2150-8925 |
| DOI: | 10.1002/ecs2.3118 |
| Popis: | The distribution and composition of Arctic vegetation are expected to shift with ongoing climate change. Global models generally predict northward shifts in high‐latitude ecotones, and analysis of remote sensing data shows widespread greening and changes in vegetation structure across the circumpolar Arctic. However, there are still uncertainties related to the timing of these shifts and variation among different plant functional types. In this paper, we investigate disequilibrium dynamics of green alder and white spruce in the Tuktoyaktuk Coastal Plain, NWT. We used high‐resolution air photographs captured in the 1970s and 2000s to quantify changes in the distribution and abundance of alder and spruce near their northern limits. We found increases in alder and spruce stem density over time, but no change in their range limits, indicating that both species are affected by leading‐edge disequilibrium. Low stand density and temperature limitation of reproduction along the northern margin likely contributed to observed disequilibrium in both species. We also observed the greatest change in species occupancy within a burned area, suggesting that the increased frequency of fire will play a significant role in the timing and magnitude of near‐term vegetation change. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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