The course of tree growth. Theory and reality

FOREST ECOLOGY AND MANAGEMENT

卷:478

Review

Pretzsch, Hans¹ 

[1] Tech Univ Munich, Ctr Life & Food Sci Weihenstephan, Chair Forest Growth & Yield Sci, Hans Carl von Carlowitz Pl 2, D-85354 Freising Weihenstephan, Germany

关键词: Growth theory;    Growth equations;    Growth trends;    Allometry;    Aging;   

DOI  :  10.1016/j.foreco.2020.118508

来源: Elsevier

【 摘 要 】

The course of tree growth, especially the level and persistence until advanced age, indicates the competitivenes and fitness of trees and determines stand structure and dynamics. The velocity of size growth and aging affects many other plants and animals living at and from trees. Thus forestry and many ecosystem functions and services are depending on the course of tree growth. First, novel empirical findings of particular persisting tree growth in various parts of the world were presented and motivated this review. The revealed increasing, mostly positive, deviations of observed from theoretically expected tree growth directed this review to be based on literature and own long-term experiments, stem analyses, and increment cores from temperate forests. Second, the common growth theory and respective growth equations were revisited; they later were used for analyzing observed courses of dominant trees' mass growth and productivity. Third, tree developments over size and age were analyzed as affected by tree species, site conditions, thinning, and fertilization and enviromental changes. Stem analyses and increment core analyses of Norway spruce (Picea abies (L.) KARST.) representing the growth from 1560 to 1882 indicated a persistence of volume growth beyond age of 300 years even in this historic period of comparatively steady environmental conditions. The mass growth of 735 dominant trees revealed mean culmination ages between 211 and 480 years with the ranking sessile oak (Quercus petraea (MATT.) LIEBL.) > European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) > Norway spruce > Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.). Trees on sites with high site index grew quicker, peaked, and decreased earlier in annual growth, whereas trees on poor sites culminated later in terms of age. The courses of annual growth in dependence on tree mass ran more synchronous on different sites. They differed much more in the level than in the rhythm. A total of 910 Scots pines on combined thinned and fertilized compared with control plots revealed for both groups a continous increase of growth until high ages and no preponed size-related growth decrease of the treated trees. For analyzing any modification of the course of growth by environmental changes I used a dataset of 591 cored European beeches and for corroboration 580 permanantly surveyed tree from long-term experiments of the four above mentiond main tree species in Europe. On top of their long-lasting growth all species together showed a strong acceleration of annual growth. Their growth acceleration was obviously caused by environmental changes and the highest in 1850 to 1900. It lessend in the last 50 years, and did not trigger any preponed age- or size related decrease. Finally, I discussed the consequences of the amazingly high and long-lasting tree growth for forest ecology, management and future research.

【 授权许可】

Free