Drought is More Stressful for Northern Populations of Scots Pine than Low Summer

pine than low summer temperatures. Silva Fennica 37(2): 175–180. Needle fl uctuating asymmetry, which is a non-specifi c stress indicator, was used to evaluate responses of Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) to annual climatic variation in the Kola Peninsula, NW Russia, during 1992–1999. Although the...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Mikhail V. Kozlov, Pekka Niemelä
Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
Format: Text
Language:English
Subjects:
Online Access:http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.577.6842
http://www.metla.fi/silvafennica/full/sf37/sf372175.pdf
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Summary:pine than low summer temperatures. Silva Fennica 37(2): 175–180. Needle fl uctuating asymmetry, which is a non-specifi c stress indicator, was used to evaluate responses of Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) to annual climatic variation in the Kola Peninsula, NW Russia, during 1992–1999. Although the 30 trees surveyed for this study demonstrated individualistic responses to the temperature and precipitation of the growth seasons, at the population level we found no effect of temperature and a signifi cant increase in fl uctuating asymmetry with a decline in precipitation during the previous August. This fi nding suggests that the vitality of Scots pine populations at the northern tree limit is controlled by late summer precipitation rather than by temperatures of the growth season.