Wild Apple Growth and Climate Change in Southeast Kazakhstan

• Published in: Forests
• Main Authors: Irina P. Panyushkina, Nurjan S. Mukhamadiev, Ann M. Lynch, Nursagim A. Ashikbaev, Alexis H. Arizpe, Christopher D. O’Connor, Danyar Abjanbaev, Gulnaz Z. Mengdіbayeva, Abay O. Sagitov
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2017
• Subjects: wild fruit wood forest; Malus sieversii; dendrochronology; climate change; Central Asia; Plant ecology; QK900-989; Arctic; Malus; Climate change
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.3390/f8110406; https://doaj.org/article/47c86db487754791b591cc06d8557e94

Wild populations of Malus sieversii [Ldb.] M. Roem are valued genetic and watershed resources in Inner Eurasia. These populations are located in a region that has experienced rapid and on-going climatic change over the past several decades. We assess relationships between climate variables and wild apple radial growth with dendroclimatological techniques to understand the potential of a changing climate to influence apple radial growth. Ring-width chronologies spanning 48 to 129 years were developed from 12 plots in the Trans-Ili Alatau and Jungar Alatau ranges of Tian Shan Mountains, southeastern Kazakhstan. Cluster analysis of the plot-level chronologies suggests different temporal patterns of growth variability over the last century in the two mountain ranges studied. Changes in the periodicity of annual ring-width variability occurred ca. 1970 at both mountain ranges, with decadal-scale variability supplanted by quasi-biennial variation. Seascorr correlation analysis of primary and secondary weather variables identified negative growth associations with spring precipitation and positive associations with cooler fall-winter temperatures, but the relative importance of these relationships varied spatially and temporally, with a shift in the relative importance of spring precipitation ca. 1970 at Trans-Ili Alatau. Altered apple tree radial growth patterns correspond to altered climatology in the Lake Balkhash Basin driven by unprecedented intensified Arctic Oscillations after the late 1970s.