School of Ecology and Environment, Key Laboratory for Space Bioscience & Biotechnology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi'an 710072, China; State Key Laboratory of Loess and Quaternary Geology (SKLLQG), and Key Laboratory of Aerosol Chemistry and Physics, Institute of Earth Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xi'an 710061, China; Department of Agroecology, Aarhus University, Tjele 8830, Denmark; Center for Circular Bioeconomy, Aarhus University, Tjele 8830, Denmark.
Center for Ecosystem Science and Society, Department of Biological Sciences, Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ 86011, USA.
Sci Total Environ. 2020 Aug 1;728:138891. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.138891. Epub 2020 Apr 24.
Predicting how shifts in plant phenology affect species dominance remains challenging, because plant phenology and species dominance have been largely investigated independently. Moreover, most phenological research has primarily focused on phenological firsts (leaf-out and first flower dates), leading to a lack of representation of phenological lasts (leaf senescence and last flower) and full phenological periods (growing season length and flower duration). Here, we simultaneously investigated the effects of experimental warming on different phenological events of various species and species dominance in an alpine meadow on the Tibetan Plateau. Warming significantly advanced phenological firsts for most species but had variable effects on phenological lasts. As a result, warming tended to extend species' full phenological periods, although this trend was not significant for all species. Experimental warming reduced community evenness and differentially impacted species dominance. Shifts in full phenological periods, rather than a single shift in phenological firsts or phenological lasts, were associated with changes in species dominance. Species with lengthened full phenological periods under warming increased their dominance. Our results advance the understanding of how altered species-specific phenophases relate to changes in community structure in response to climate change.
预测植物物候变化如何影响物种优势仍然具有挑战性，因为植物物候和物种优势在很大程度上是独立研究的。此外，大多数物候学研究主要集中在物候的开始（叶子展开和第一朵花的日期），导致物候的结束（叶子衰老和最后一朵花）和完整的物候期（生长季节长度和花持续时间）代表性不足。在这里，我们同时研究了青藏高原高山草甸上实验加热对不同物种和物种优势的不同物候事件的影响。加热显著提前了大多数物种的物候开始，但对物候结束的影响则不同。因此，尽管并非所有物种都呈现出显著趋势，但变暖往往会延长物种的完整物候期。实验加热降低了群落均匀度，并对物种优势产生了不同的影响。与单一的物候开始或物候结束的转变相比，完整物候期的转变与物种优势的变化有关。在变暖条件下，完整物候期延长的物种增加了其优势度。我们的研究结果推进了对特定物种的物候阶段如何与气候变化导致的群落结构变化相关的理解。
