Compound climate events increase tree drought mortality across European forests

Abstract

Climate change can lead to the simultaneous occurrence of extreme droughts and heat waves increasing the frequency of compound events with unknown impacts on forests. Here we use two independent datasets, a compiled database of tree drought mortality events and the ICP-Forest level I plots, to study the impacts of the simultaneous occurrence of hot summers, with elevated vapour pressure deficit (VPD), and dry years on forest defoliation and mortality across Europe. We focused on tree drought mortality and background mortality rates, and we studied their co-occurrence with compound events of hot summers and dry years. In total, 143 out of 310 mortality events across Europe, i.e. 46% of cases, corresponded with rare compound events characterized by hot summers and dry years. Over the past decades, summer temperature increased in most sites and severe droughts resulted in compound events not observed before the 1980s. From the ICP-Forest plots we identified 291 (1718 trees) and 61 plots (128 trees) where severe defoliation and mortality, respectively, were caused by drought. The analyses of these events showed that 34% and 27% of the defoliation and mortality cases corresponded with rare compound climate events, respectively. Background mortality rates across Europe in the period 1993-2013 presented higher values in regions where summer temperature and VPD more steeply rose, where drought frequency increased. The steady increase in summer temperatures and VPD in Southern and Eastern Europe may favor the occurrence of compound events of hot summers and dry conditions. Giving that both, local and intense tree drought mortality events and background forest mortality rates, are linked to such compound events we can expect an increase in forest drought mortality in these European regions over the next decades.

Keywords: Defoliation; Drought stress; Forest dieback; Summer temperature; Tree vigor.