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Despite growing interest in predicting plant phenological shifts, advanced spring phenology by global climate change remains debated. Evidence documenting either small or large advancement of spring phenology to rising temperature over the spatio‐temporal scales implies a potential existence of a thermal threshold in the responses of forests to global warming. We collected a unique data set of xylem cell‐wall‐thickening onset dates in 20 coniferous species covering a broad mean annual temperature (MAT) gradient (−3.05 to 22.9°C) across the Northern Hemisphere (latitudes 23°–66° N). Along the MAT gradient, we identified a threshold temperature (using segmented regression) of 4.9 ± 1.1°C, above which the response of xylem phenology to rising temperatures significantly decline. This threshold separates the Northern Hemisphere conifers into cold and warm thermal niches, with MAT and spring forcing being the primary drivers for the onset dates (estimated by linear and Bayesian mixed‐effect models), respectively. The identified thermal threshold should be integrated into the Earth‐System‐Models for a better understanding of spring phenology in response to global warming and an improved prediction of global climate‐carbon feedbacks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A major component of climate change is an increase in temperature and precipitation variability. Over the last few decades, an increase in the frequency of extremely warm temperatures and drought severity has been observed across Europe. These warmer and drier conditions may reduce productivity and trigger compositional shifts in forest communities. However, we still lack a robust, biogeographical characterization of the negative impacts of climate extremes, such as droughts on forests. In this context, we investigated the impact of the 2017 summer drought on European forests. The normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) was used as a proxy of forest productivity and was related to the standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index, which accounts for the temperature effects of the climate water balance. The spatial pattern of NDVI reduction in 2017 was largely driven by the extremely warm summer for parts of the central and eastern Mediterranean Basin (Italian and Balkan Peninsulas). The vulnerability to the 2017 summer drought was heterogeneously distributed over Europe, and topographic factors buffered some of the negative impacts. Mediterranean forests dominated by oak species were the most negatively impacted, whereas Pinus pinaster was the most resilient species. The impact of drought on the NDVI decreased at high elevations and mainly on east and north‐east facing slopes. We illustrate how an adequate characterization of the coupling between climate conditions and forest productivity (NDVI) allows the determination of the most vulnerable areas to drought. This approach could be widely used for other extreme climate events and when considering other spatially resolved proxies of forest growth and health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The mechanisms translating global circulation changes into rapid abrupt shifts in forest carbon capture in semi‐arid biomes remain poorly understood. Here, we report unprecedented multidecadal shifts in forest carbon uptake in semi‐arid Mediterranean pine forests in Spain over 1950–2012. The averaged carbon sink reduction varies between 31% and 37%, and reaches values in the range of 50% in the most affected forest stands. Regime shifts in forest carbon uptake are associated with climatic early warning signals, decreased forest regional synchrony and reduced long‐term carbon sink resilience. We identify the mechanisms linked to ocean multidecadal variability that shape regime shifts in carbon capture. First, we show that low‐frequency variations of the surface temperature of the Atlantic Ocean induce shifts in the non‐stationary effects of El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) on regional forest carbon capture. Modelling evidence supports that the non‐stationary effects of ENSO can be propagated from tropical areas to semi‐arid Mediterranean biomes through atmospheric wave trains. Second, decadal changes in the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) significantly alter sea–air heat exchanges, modifying in turn ocean vapour transport over land and land surface temperatures, and promoting sustained drought conditions in spring and summer that reduce forest carbon uptake. Third, we show that lagged effects of AMO on the winter North Atlantic Oscillation also contribute to the maintenance of long‐term droughts. Finally, we show that the reported strong, negative effects of ocean surface temperature (AMO) on forest carbon uptake in the last decades are unprecedented over the last 150 years. Our results provide new, unreported explanations for carbon uptake shifts in these drought‐prone forests and review the expected impacts of global warming on the profiled mechanisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The phenology of wood formation is a critical process to consider for predicting how trees from the temperate and boreal zones may react to climate change. Compared to leaf phenology, however, the determinism of wood phenology is still poorly known. Here, we compared for the first time three alternative ecophysiological model classes (threshold models, heat‐sum models and chilling‐influenced heat‐sum models) and an empirical model in their ability to predict the starting date of xylem cell enlargement in spring, for four major Northern Hemisphere conifers (Larix decidua, Pinus sylvestris, Picea abies and Picea mariana). We fitted models with Bayesian inference to wood phenological data collected for 220 site‐years over Europe and Canada. The chilling‐influenced heat‐sum model received most support for all the four studied species, predicting validation data with a 7.7‐day error, which is within one day of the observed data resolution. We conclude that both chilling and forcing temperatures determine the onset of wood formation in Northern Hemisphere conifers. Importantly, the chilling‐influenced heat‐sum model showed virtually no spatial bias whichever the species, despite the large environmental gradients considered. This suggests that the spring onset of wood formation is far less affected by local adaptation than by environmentally driven plasticity. In a context of climate change, we therefore expect rising winter–spring temperature to exert ambivalent effects on the spring onset of wood formation, tending to hasten it through the accumulation of forcing temperature, but imposing a higher forcing temperature requirement through the lower accumulation of chilling. A temperature sum model influenced by chilling accumulation predicts the spring onset of xylem enlargement across temperate and boreal latitudes, in four major Northern Hemisphere conifers. This model outperformed heat‐sums and threshold models. On the figure, plots per species show predicted (coloured lines) and observed (grey dots) xylem onset dates, sorted by temperatures during the January–June period. The central plot shows the species‐specific relation between chilling and forcing accumulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Among forest ecosystems, the alpine treeline ecotone can be considered to be a simplified model to study global ecology and climate change. Alpine treelines are expected to shift upwards in response to global warming given that tree recruitment and growth are assumed to be mainly limited by low temperatures. However, little is known whether precipitation and temperature interact to drive long‐term Himalayan treeline dynamics. Tree growth is affected by spring rainfall in the central Himalayan treelines, being good locations for testing if, in addition to temperature, precipitation mediates treeline dynamics. To test this hypothesis, we reconstructed spatiotemporal variations in treeline dynamics in 20 plots located at six alpine treeline sites, dominated by two tree species (birch, fir), and situated along an east–west precipitation gradient in the central Himalayas. Our reconstructions evidenced that treelines shifted upward in response to recent climate warming, but their shift rates were primarily mediated by spring precipitation. The rate of upward shift was higher in the wettest eastern Himalayas, suggesting that its ascent rate was facilitated by spring precipitation. The drying tendency in association with the recent warming trends observed in the central Himalayas, however, will likely hinder an upslope advancement of alpine treelines and promote downward treeline shifts if moisture availability crosses a critical minimum threshold. Our study highlights the complexity of plant responses to climate and the need to consider multiple climate factors when analyzing treeline dynamics. Based on 20 treeline plots along an east–west precipitation gradient in the central Himalayas, this research showed that treelines shifted upward in response to recent climate warming, but their shift rates were mediated by spring precipitation. The drying tendency in association with the recent warming trends observed in the central Himalayas, however, will likely hinder an upslope advancement of alpine treelines and promote downward treeline shifts if moisture availability crosses a critical minimum threshold. Our study highlights the complexity of plant responses to climate and the need to consider multiple climate factors when analyzing treeline dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is a response to Zang et al., 26, 322–324. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Forecasted increase drought frequency and severity may drive worldwide declines in forest productivity. Species‐level responses to a drier world are likely to be influenced by their functional traits. Here, we analyse forest resilience to drought using an extensive network of tree‐ring width data and satellite imagery. We compiled proxies of forest growth and productivity (TRWi, absolutely dated ring‐width indices; NDVI, Normalized Difference Vegetation Index) for 11 tree species and 502 forests in Spain corresponding to Mediterranean, temperate, and continental biomes. Four different components of forest resilience to drought were calculated based on TRWi and NDVI data before, during, and after four major droughts (1986, 1994–1995, 1999, and 2005), and pointed out that TRWi data were more sensitive metrics of forest resilience to drought than NDVI data. Resilience was related to both drought severity and forest composition. Evergreen gymnosperms dominating semi‐arid Mediterranean forests showed the lowest resistance to drought, but higher recovery than deciduous angiosperms dominating humid temperate forests. Moreover, semi‐arid gymnosperm forests presented a negative temporal trend in the resistance to drought, but this pattern was absent in continental and temperate forests. Although gymnosperms in dry Mediterranean forests showed a faster recovery after drought, their recovery potential could be constrained if droughts become more frequent. Conversely, angiosperms and gymnosperms inhabiting temperate and continental sites might have problems to recover after more intense droughts since they resist drought but are less able to recover afterwards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate warming is expected to enhance productivity and growth of woody plants, particularly in temperature-limited environments at the northernmost or uppermost limits of their distribution. However, this warming is spatially uneven and temporally variable, and the rise in temperatures differently affects biomes and growth forms. Here, applying a dendroecological approach with generalized additive mixed models, we analysed how the growth of shrubby junipers and coexisting trees (larch and pine species) responds to rising temperatures along a 5000-km latitudinal range including sites from the Polar, Alpine to the Mediterranean biomes. We hypothesize that, being more coupled to ground microclimate, junipers will be less influenced by atmospheric conditions and will less respond to the post-1950 climate warming than coexisting standing trees. Unexpectedly, shrub and tree growth forms revealed divergent growth trends in all the three biomes, with juniper performing better than trees at Mediterranean than at Polar and Alpine sites. The post-1980s decline of tree growth in Mediterranean sites might be induced by drought stress amplified by climate warming and did not affect junipers. We conclude that different but coexisting long-living growth forms can respond differently to the same climate factor and that, even in temperature-limited area, other drivers like the duration of snow cover might locally play a fundamental role on woody plants growth across Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Growth models can be used to assess forest vulnerability to climate warming. If global warming amplifies water deficit in drought-prone areas, tree populations located at the driest and southernmost distribution limits (rear-edges) should be particularly threatened. Here, we address these statements by analyzing and projecting growth responses to climate of three major tree species (silver fir, Abies alba; Scots pine, Pinus sylvestris; and mountain pine, Pinus uncinata) in mountainous areas of NE Spain. This region is subjected to Mediterranean continental conditions, it encompasses wide climatic, topographic and environmental gradients, and, more importantly, it includes rear-edges of the continuous distributions of these tree species. We used tree-ring width data from a network of 110 forests in combination with the process-based Vaganov-Shashkin-Lite growth model and climate-growth analyses to forecast changes in tree growth during the 21st century. Climatic projections were based on four ensembles CO2 emission scenarios. Warm and dry conditions during the growing season constrain silver fir and Scots pine growth, particularly at the species rear-edge. By contrast, growth of high-elevation mountain pine forests is enhanced by climate warming. The emission scenario ( RCP 8.5) corresponding to the most pronounced warming (+1.4 to 4.8 °C) forecasted mean growth reductions of −10.7% and −16.4% in silver fir and Scots pine, respectively, after 2050. This indicates that rising temperatures could amplify drought stress and thus constrain the growth of silver fir and Scots pine rear-edge populations growing at xeric sites. Contrastingly, mountain pine growth is expected to increase by +12.5% due to a longer and warmer growing season. The projections of growth reduction in silver fir and Scots pine portend dieback and a contraction of their species distribution areas through potential local extinctions of the most vulnerable driest rear-edge stands. Our modeling approach provides accessible tools to evaluate forest vulnerability to warmer conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Species Distribution Models ( SDMs) were employed to assess the potential impact of climate change on the distribution of Pinus uncinata in the Pyrenees, where it is the dominant tree species in subalpine forest and alpine tree lines. Predicting forest response to climate change is a challenging task in mountain regions but also a conservation priority. We examined the potential impact of spatial scale on SDM projections by conducting all analyses at four spatial resolutions. We further examined the potential effect of dispersal constraints by applying a threshold distance of maximal advancement derived from a spatially explicit, individual-based simulation model of tree line dynamics. Under current conditions, SDM s including climatic factors related to stress or growth limitation performed best. These models were then employed to project P. uncinata distribution under two emission scenarios, using data generated from several regional climate models. At the end of this century, P. uncinata is expected to migrate northward and upward, occupying habitat currently inhabited by alpine plant species. However, consideration of dispersal limitation and/or changing the spatial resolution of the analysis modified the assessment of climate change impact on mountain ecosystems, especially in the case of estimates of colonization and extinction at the regional scale. Our study highlights the need to improve the characterization of biological processes within SDMs, as well as to consider simultaneously different scales when assessing potential habitat loss under future climate conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]