Key Laboratory of Alpine Ecology and Biodiversity, Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100101, China.
Key Laboratory of Adaptation and Evolution of Plateau Biota, Northwest Institute of Plateau Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xining, 810008, China.
Ecology. 2017 Mar;98(3):734-740. doi: 10.1002/ecy.1685. Epub 2017 Feb 10.
Our ability to predict how temperature modifies phenology at the community scale is limited by our lack of understanding of responses by functional groups of flowering plants. These responses differ among species with different life histories. We performed a reciprocal transplant experiment along four elevation gradients (e.g., 3,200, 3,400, 3,600 and 3,800 m) to investigate the effects of warming (transferred downward) and cooling (transferred upward) on plant flowering functional groups (FFGs) and community phenological sequences (i.e., seven phenological events). Warming significantly decreased early-spring-flowering (ESF) plant coverage and increased mid-summer-flowering plant (MSF) coverage, while cooling had the opposite effect. All community phenological events were advanced by warming and delayed by cooling except for the date of complete leaf-coloring, which showed the opposite response. Warming and cooling could cause greater advance or delay in early-season phenological events of the community through increased coverage of MSF species, and warming could delay late-season phenological events of the community by increased coverage of ESF species. These results suggested that coverage change of FFGs in the community induced by temperature change could mediate the responses of the community phenological events to temperature change in the future. The response of phenological events to temperature change at the species level may not be sufficient to predict phenological responses at the community-level due to phenological compensation between species in the community.
我们预测温度如何在群落尺度上改变物候的能力受到我们对开花植物功能群对温度响应的理解的限制。这些响应因物种的不同生活史而异。我们沿着四个海拔梯度（例如 3200、3400、3600 和 3800 m）进行了一个相互移植实验，以研究升温（向下转移）和降温（向上转移）对植物开花功能群（FFG）和群落物候序列（即七个物候事件）的影响。升温显著降低了早春开花（ESF）植物的覆盖率，增加了仲夏开花（MSF）植物的覆盖率，而降温则产生相反的效果。除了完全变色日期外，所有群落物候事件都因升温而提前，因降温而延迟。升温和降温可以通过增加 MSF 物种的覆盖率，使群落早期物候事件提前或延迟，而升温可以通过增加 ESF 物种的覆盖率，使群落后期物候事件延迟。这些结果表明，未来温度变化引起的群落 FFG 覆盖变化可能会调节群落物候事件对温度变化的响应。由于群落中物种之间的物候补偿，物种水平上物候事件对温度变化的响应可能不足以预测群落水平上的物候响应。
