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Seasonal variation in photosynthesis in six woody species with different leaf phenology in a valley savanna in southwestern China

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Abstract

During 2003–2005, we examined the effect of seasonal drought on water status, gas exchange, δ13C, chlorophyll fluorescence and spectral reflectance in six woody species in a valley savanna near the Yuanjiang River (the upper Red River) in southwestern China. Three different phenological types of these woody species were compared, i.e., an evergreen species, Cyclobalanopsis helferiana, two winter-deciduous (WD) species, Buchanania latifolia and Symplocos racemosa, and three drought-deciduous (DD) species, Terminthia paniculata, Wendlandia tinctoria and Woodfordia fruticosa. We aimed to test the following three hypotheses: (1) the evergreen and WD species employ a drought avoidance strategy, whereas DD species employ a drought tolerance strategy; (2) the evergreen and WD species have a more economical water use strategy than the DD species and (3) the evergreen and WD species have a stronger photoprotection capacity through thermal dissipation than the DD species. At the end of a prolonged drought, the predawn leaf water potential (Ψpd) in C. helferiana and S. racemosa dropped to ca. −0.8 MPa, whereas the Ψpd in B. latifolia remained close to zero and DD species were leafless. In the rainy seasons, maximal photosynthetic rates of the evergreen (18.4 μmol m−2 s−1) and W. fruticosa (18.0 μmol m−2 s−1) were higher than those of the other four species (12.2−13.8 μmol m−2 s−1). The evergreen and WD species responded to drought by closing stomata and thus maintained a constant relative water content (RWC), which is a typical drought avoidance strategy; however, it is at the expense of carbon gain. DD species maintained a high photosynthetic capacity with a decrease in both stomatal conductance and RWC until the driest period, and then shifted from the drought tolerance strategy to the avoidance mechanism by shoot dieback. There was no significant difference in the means of δ13C across the phenological groups. The evergreen and WD species had stronger heat dissipation than the DD species in dry seasons. All species increased leaf spectral reflectance, probably because of degradation of chlorophyll as indicated by the leaf reflectance index, which should reduce light harvesting. All species showed a strong increase in the ratio of red to green spectral reflectance of leaves during dry seasons, indicating the accumulation of anthocyanin, which may contribute to screening sunlight and scavenging reactive oxygen species. Different responses to drought of savanna woody species with different leaf phenologies may facilitate the partitioning of resource use and hence their co-existence.

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Acknowledgments

We thank Mr. Guoda Tao for identification of the study plants, Mr. Fuqiang Song for assistance with some of the field measurements, and the three anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on our manuscript. The Yuanjiang Meteorological Station provided the climatic data. This study was co-funded by the National Science Foundation of China and the Chinese Academy of Sciences through two research projects (No. 90302013 and No. KSCX2-SW-116) led by KFC.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Mengla, Yunnan, 666303, China

    Jiao-Lin Zhang, Jun-Jie Zhu & Kun-Fang Cao

  2. Graduate University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, 19A, Yuquan road, Beijing, 100049, China

    Jiao-Lin Zhang & Jun-Jie Zhu

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  1. Jiao-Lin Zhang
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Correspondence to Kun-Fang Cao.

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Communicated by W. Bilger.

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Zhang, JL., Zhu, JJ. & Cao, KF. Seasonal variation in photosynthesis in six woody species with different leaf phenology in a valley savanna in southwestern China. Trees 21, 631–643 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00468-007-0156-9

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