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Climate sensitivity of radial growth in European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) at different aspects in southwestern Germany

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Abstract

The climate sensitivity of radial growth in European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) was analyzed within a narrow valley in the Swabian Alb (southwestern Germany). We collected stem disks from three aspects (NE, NW and SW) of trees belonging to different social classes. Common climatic factors limiting growth across the valley were identified using a principal component analysis (PCA). Further, we performed hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA), redundancy analysis (RDA) and bootstrapped correlation analysis to reveal differences in chronologies and climate-growth relationships between aspect and social class. Climatic variables considered in our analyses were monthly and seasonal data on temperature and precipitation, as well as a self-calibrating Palmer drought severity index (sc-PDSI). We identified drought in the period June–August as the most prominent factor limiting growth across the valley. Dominant and co-dominant trees at the NW and SW aspects were found to be particularly drought sensitive, whereas intermediate trees were less susceptible to drought. Underlying causes of established climate–growth relationships are discussed in the context of drought susceptibility, tree-size modulation and tree physiological processes.

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Acknowledgments

The author is grateful to Stadtwald Tuttlingen for supporting the tree sampling. He would like to thank two anonymous reviewers who significantly helped on improving earlier versions of this manuscript. Also Felix Baab and Clemens Koch are thankfully acknowledged for their field assistance and technical support in the lab. This study was conducted with financial support of the EU-FP7 project MOTIVE (‘Models for adaptive forest management’, grant No. 226544).

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  1. Institute for Forest Growth, University of Freiburg, Tennenbacherstrasse 4, 79106, Freiburg, Germany

    Ernst van der Maaten

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Correspondence to Ernst van der Maaten.

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Communicated by R. Matyssek.

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van der Maaten, E. Climate sensitivity of radial growth in European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) at different aspects in southwestern Germany. Trees 26, 777–788 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00468-011-0645-8

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