Wood Anatomical Traits Respond to Climate but More Individualistically as Compared to Radial Growth: Analyze Trees, Not Means

• Published in: Forests Vol. 13; no. 6; p. 956
• Main Authors: Angelo Rita, Jesús Julio Camarero, Michele Colangelo, Ester González de Andrés, Marín Pompa-García
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 01-06-2022
• Subjects: dendroclimatology; Pinus halepensis; Pinus lumholtzii; Pinus sylvestris; quantitative wood anatomy; xylem
• ISSN: 1999-4907
• DOI: 10.3390/f13060956

Wood encodes environmental information that can be recovered through the study of tree-ring width and wood anatomical variables such as lumen area or cell-wall thickness. Anatomical variables often provide a stronger hydroclimate signal than tree-ring width, but they show a low tree-to-tree coherence. We investigate the sources of variation in tree-ring width, lumen area, and cell-wall thickness in three pine species inhabiting sites with contrasting climate conditions: Pinus lumholtzii in wet-summer northern Mexico, and Pinus halepensis and Pinus sylvestris in dry-summer north-eastern Spain. We quantified the amount of variance of these three variables explained by spring and summer water balance and how it varied among trees. Wood anatomical variables accounted for a larger inter-individual variability than tree-ring width data. Anatomical traits responded to hydroclimate more individualistically than tree-ring width. This individualistic response represents an important issue in long-term studies on wood anatomical characteristics. We emphasized the degree of variation among individuals of the same population, which has far-reaching implications for understanding tree species’ responses to climate change. Dendroclimatic and wood anatomical studies should focus on trees rather than on the mean population series.