Publication Details

Category Text Publication
Reference Category Journals
DOI 10.1038/s41598-023-38087-9
Licence creative commons licence
Title (Primary) Observational evidence of legacy effects of the 2018 drought on a mixed deciduous forest in Germany
Author Pohl, F.; Werban, U. ORCID logo ; Kumar, R. ORCID logo ; Hildebrandt, A.; Rebmann, C.
Source Titel Scientific Reports
Year 2023
Department CHS; MET; iDiv
Volume 13
Page From art. 10863
Language englisch
Topic T5 Future Landscapes
Data and Software links https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7638744
Supplements https://static-content.springer.com/esm/art%3A10.1038%2Fs41598-023-38087-9/MediaObjects/41598_2023_38087_MOESM1_ESM.pdf
Abstract Forests play a major role in the global carbon cycle, and droughts have been shown to explain much of the interannual variability in the terrestrial carbon sink capacity. The quantification of drought legacy effects on ecosystem carbon fluxes is a challenging task, and research on the ecosystem scale remains sparse. In this study we investigate the delayed response of an extreme drought event on the carbon cycle in the mixed deciduous forest site ’Hohes Holz’ (DE-HoH) located in Central Germany, using the measurements taken between 2015 and 2020. Our analysis demonstrates that the extreme drought and heat event in 2018 had strong legacy effects on the carbon cycle in 2019, but not in 2020. On an annual basis, net ecosystem productivity was ∼16% higher in 2018 (∼424gCm−2) and ∼25% lower in 2019 (∼274gCm−2) compared to pre-drought years (∼367gCm−2). Using spline regression, we show that while current hydrometeorological conditions can explain forest productivity in 2020, they do not fully explain the decrease in productivity in 2019. Including long-term drought information in the statistical model reduces overestimation error of productivity in 2019 by nearly 50%. We also found that short-term drought events have positive impacts on the carbon cycle at the beginning of the vegetation season, but negative impacts in later summer, while long-term drought events have generally negative impacts throughout the growing season. Overall, our findings highlight the importance of considering the diverse and complex impacts of extreme events on ecosystem fluxes, including the timing, temporal scale, and magnitude of the events, and the need to use consistent definitions of drought to clearly convey immediate and delayed responses.
Persistent UFZ Identifier https://www.ufz.de/index.php?en=20939&ufzPublicationIdentifier=27235
Pohl, F., Werban, U., Kumar, R., Hildebrandt, A., Rebmann, C. (2023):
Observational evidence of legacy effects of the 2018 drought on a mixed deciduous forest in Germany
Sci. Rep. 13 , art. 10863 10.1038/s41598-023-38087-9