Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Responses of plants to temporally heterogeneous water conditions in species from different ranges of habitats

  • Research Article
  • Published:
Tropical Ecology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Soil moisture resources are highly spatially and temporally heterogeneous. Although temporal heterogeneous water conditions have a more common impact on plants than spatial heterogeneous conditions, very few studies have been conducted to investigate how plants respond to existing temporally heterogeneous water conditions. To address this issue, we adopted three species with different habitat ranges, including a karst-endemic species of Kmeria septentrionalis (growing in karst habitats only), a karst-suitable species of Celtis sinensis (occur in both habitats) and a non-karst species of Lithocarpus glaber (found in normal habitats only), and conducted a greenhouse experimental study at Guizhou University, Guiyang, China. This study explored the response ability and coping strategies of seedlings from various habitats by comparing the differences in growth of biomass, and physiological traits of the three species in response to temporally heterogeneous water (alternating drought and waterlogging) and temporally homogeneous water (constant moist) treatments. Compared with constant moist treatment, the first round of temporally heterogeneous water treatment reduced the growth of leaf, root, and total biomass increased the contents of osmoregulation substances, malondialdehyde, and antioxidant enzyme activities. However, the third round of temporally heterogeneous water treatment improved their late growth of biomass, and the content of physiological traits was also significantly decreased. K. septentrionalis showed a higher compensation effect in late growth by early heterogeneous experience. Typical karst species may be more able to benefit from early experience with temporally heterogeneous environments, due to long-term adaptation to karst habitats of great heterogeneity and low resource availability. The temporally heterogeneous water conditions can induce plants to produce a higher physiological response, and inhibit the current growth of plants, but can enhance the adaptability of plants to similar stress events in the later period. The ability of species to respond to temporally heterogeneous water treatment may be related to their habitat range.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Ackermann M (2015) A functional perspective on phenotypic heterogeneity in microorganisms. Nat Rev Microbiol 13:497–508

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Agrawal AA (2000) Overcompensation of plants in response to herbivory and the by-product benefits of mutualism. Trends Plant Sci 5:309–313

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Balakhnina T, Gins M, Fomina I (2019) Oxidative stress development in the leaves of Amaranthus cruentus L. containing amaranthine under conditions of nighttime low temperatures, soil hypoxia and the combined effects of both stress factors. Int Agrophys 33:511–516

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Beaumont HJE, Gallie J, Kost C, Ferguson GC, Rainey PB (2009) Experimental evolution of bet hedging. Nature 462:90–93

    Article  ADS  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Bhadouria R, Srivastava P, Singh R, Raghubanshi AS (2016) Understanding the ecology of tree seedling growth in dry tropical environment: a management perspective. Energy Ecol Environ 1:296–309

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bhadouria R, Srivastava P, Singh R, Raghubanshi AS (2017a) Tree seedling establishment in dry tropics: an urgent need of interaction studies. Environ Syst Decis 37:88–100

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bhadouria R, Singh R, Srivastava P, Raghubanshi AS (2017b) Interactive effect of water and nutrient on survival and growth of tree seedlings of four dry tropical tree species under grass competition. Trop Ecol 58:611–621

    Google Scholar 

  • Bonacci O, Pipan T, Culver DC (2008) A framework for karst ecohydrology. Environ Geol 56:891–900

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  • Doupis G, Kavroulakis N, Psarras G, Papadakis IE (2017) Growth, photosynthetic performance and antioxidative response of ‘Hass’ and ‘Fuerte’avocado (Persea americana Mill.) Plants grown under high soil moisture. Photosynthetica 55:655–663

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Farkas Z, Varga-László E, Anda A, Veisz O, Varga B (2020) Effects of waterlogging, drought and their combination on yield and water-use efficiency of five hungarian winter wheat varieties. Water 12:1318

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Flexas J, Bota J, Cifre J, Escalona JM, Medrano H (2015) Understanding down-regulation of photosynthesis under water stress: future prospects and searching for physiological tools for irrigation management. Ann Appl Biol 144:273–283

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Garcia FHS, Mendonca AMDC, Rodrigues M, Matias FI, Filho MPDS, Santos HRB, Taffner J, Barbosa JPRAD (2020) Water deficit tolerance in sugarcane is dependent on the accumulation of sugar in the leaf. Ann Appl Biol 176:65–74

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gobron N, Pinty B, Melin F, Taberner M, Verstraete MM, Belward A, Lavergne T, Widlowski JL (2005) The state of vegetation in Europe following the 2003 drought. Int J Remote Sens 26:2013–2020

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gomathi R, Chandran K (2009) Effect of water logging on growth and yield of sugarcane clones. Sugarcane Breeding Institute (SBI-ICAR). Quart News Lett 29:1–2

  • Hasanuzzaman M, Bhuyan MHMB, Zulfiqar F, Raza A, Mohsin SM, Mahmud JA, Fujita M, Fotopoulos V (2020) Reactive oxygen species and antioxidant defense in plants under abiotic stress: revisiting the crucial role of a universal defense regulator. Antioxidants 9:681

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Lázaro-Nogal A, Matesanz S, Godoy A, Pérez-Trautman F, Gianoli E, Valladares F (2015) Environmental heterogeneity leads to higher plasticity in dry-edge populations of a semi-arid chilean shrub: insights into climate change responses. J Ecol 103:338–350

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Liu ZB, Zhou YJ, Yang GZ, Ou LJ, Zou XX (2015) Research progress in waterlogging of plant. Hubei Agric Sci 54:4385–4389

    Google Scholar 

  • Liu C, Huang Y, Wu F, Liu W, Ning Y, Huang Z, Tang S, Liang Y (2021) Plant adaptability in karst regions. J Plant Res 134:889–906

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Ma J, Liu XD, Meng HJ, Zhao WJ, Wang RX, Wang YL, Ren XF (2018) Effects of water stress on growth and physiological characteristics of seedlings of the Xanthoceras sorbifolia. J Arid Land Res Environ 32:128–132

    Google Scholar 

  • Marchiori PER, Machado EC, Sales CRG, Espinoza-Núñez E, Magalhães Filho JR, Souza GM, Pires RCM, Ribeiro RV (2017) Physiological plasticity is important for maintaining sugarcane growth under water deficit. Front Plant Sci 8:02148

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Miao S, Zou CB, Breshears DD (2009) Vegetation responses to extreme hydrological events: sequence matters. Am Nat 173:113–118

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Miller G, Suzuki N, Ciftci-Yilmaz S, Mittler R (2010) Reactive oxygen species homeostasis and signaling during drought and salinity stresses. Plant Cell Environ 33:453–467

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Misra V, Solomon S, Mall AK, Prajapati CP, Hashem A, Abd-Allah EF, Ansari MI (2020) Morphological assessment of water stressed sugarcane: a comparison of waterlogged and drought affected crop. Saudi J Biol Sci 27:1228–1236

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Nikiforou C, Manetas Y (2017) Ecological stress memory: evidence in two out of seven speciesthrough the examination of the relationship between leaf fluctuating asymmetry andphotosynthesis. Ecol Indic 74:530–534

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Parelle J, Roudaut JP, Ducrey M (2006) Light acclimation and photosynthetic response of beech (Fagussylvatica L.) saplings under artificial shading or natural Mediterranean conditions. Ann For Sci 63:257–266

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Peñuelas J, Munné-Bosch S, Llusi J, Filella I (2004) Leaf reflectance and photo- and antioxidant protection in field-grown summer-stressed Phillyrea angustifolia. Opt signals oxidative stress? New Phytol 162:115–124

    Google Scholar 

  • Posch S, Bennett LT (2009) Photosynthesis, photochemistry and antioxidative defence in response to two drought severities and with re-watering in Allocasuarina luehmannii. Plant Biol 11:83–93

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Querejeta JI, Estrada-Medina H, Allen MF, Jiménez-Osornio JJ (2007) Water source partitioning among trees growing on shallow karst soils in a seasonally dry tropical climate. Oecologia 152:26–36

    Article  ADS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Romero-Munar A, Baraza E, Cifre J, Achir C, Gulías J (2018) Leaf plasticity and stomatal regulation determines the ability of Arundo donax plantlets to cope with water stress. Photosynthetica 56:698–706

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sahitya UL, Krishna MSR, Prasad GS, Kasim DP, Deepthi RS (2018) Seed antioxidants interplay with drought stress tolerance indices in chilli (Capsicum annuum L.) seedlings. BioMed Res Int 1605096

  • Sang ZY, Ma LY, Chen FJ (2011) Growth and physiological characteristics of Magnolia wuf engensis seedlings under drought stress. Acta Bot Boreali-Occidentalia Sinica 31:109–115

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Solanki JK, Sarangi SK (2014) Effect of drought stress on proline accumulation in peanut genotypes. Int J Adv Res 2:301–309

    Google Scholar 

  • Tombesi S, Frioni T, Poni S, Palliotti A (2018) Effect of water stress “memory” on plant behavior during subsequent drought stress. Environ Exp Bot 150:106–114

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tripathi SN, Bhadouria R, Srivastava P, Singh R, Raghubanshi AS (2018) The effects of interacting gradient of irradiance and water on seedlings of five tropical dry forest tree species. Trop Ecol 59:489–504

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Umair M, Sun N, Du H, Yuan J, Abbasi A, Wen J, Yu W, Zhou J, Liu C (2019) Differential metabolic responses of shrubs and grasses to water additions in arid karst region, southwestern China. Sci Rep 9:9613

    Article  ADS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Vodnik D, Gričar J, Lavrič M, Ferlan M, Hafner P, Eler K (2019) Anatomical and physiological adjustments of pubescent oak (Quercus pubescens Willd.) From two adjacent sub-mediterranean ecosites. Environ Exp Bot 165:208–218

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Walter J, Beierkuhnlein C, Jentsch A, Kreyling J (2013) Ecological stress memory and cross stress tolerance in plants in the face of climate extremes. Environ Exp Bot 94:3–8

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wang S, Callaway RM, Zhou DW, Seiner J (2017) Experience of inundation or drought alters the responses of plants to subsequent water conditions. J Ecol 105:176–187

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wang Y, Ni F, Yin D, Chen L, Li Y, He L, Zhang Y (2021) Physiological response of Lagerstroemia indica (L.) Pers. Seedlings to drought and rewatering. Trop Plant Biol 14:213–223

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Weinig C, Delph LF (2001) Phenotypic plasticity early in life constrains developmental responses later. Evolution 55:930–936

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Yang WC, Lin KH, Wu CW, Chang YJ, Chang YS (2020) Effects of waterlogging with different water resources on plant growth and tolerance capacity of four herbaceous flowers in a bioretention basin. Water 12:1619

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zhu SQ, He JX, Wei LM, Zhang CG, Chen ZR (2003) Karst forest ecology research III. Guizhou science and Technology Press

  • Zou Q (2000) Experimental guidance on plant physiology. China Agricultural Press

Download references

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the reviewers and editors who all provided useful feedback on this manuscript. The authors would like to thank Forest Resources and Environment Research Center in Guizhou Province for its support.

Funding

This research was funded by National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC, 31800335), and Key Project of Hunan Provincial Department of Education ([2021] 352-21A0473).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Urban and Rural Construction, Shaoyang University, Shaoyang, 422000, China

    Deng Wang & Yeshe Wang

  2. College of Forestry, Forest Ecology Research Center, Guizhou University, Guiyang, 550025, China

    Deng Wang & Shu Wang

Authors
  1. Deng Wang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Yeshe Wang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Shu Wang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

DW and SW conceptualized and designed the experiments. DW and YW performed experiments, analyzed data, and wrote the initial draft of the manuscript. DW and SW participated in editing the paper.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Shu Wang.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

The author declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Rights and permissions

Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Wang, D., Wang, Y. & Wang, S. Responses of plants to temporally heterogeneous water conditions in species from different ranges of habitats. Trop Ecol 65, 1–10 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42965-023-00301-0

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s42965-023-00301-0

Keywords

Search

Navigation