Effect of water availability on growth, water use efficiency and omega 3 (ALA) content in two phenotypes of chia (Salvia hispanica L.) established in the arid Mediterranean zone of Chile

Abstract Suitable plant water dynamics and the ability to withstand periods of low moisture input facilitate plant establishment in seasonally arid regions. Temperate bamboos are a major constituent of mixed evergreen and deciduous forests throughout temperate East Asia but play only an incidental role in North American forests and are altogether absent in the Pacific Northwest forest. Many bamboo species are classified as mesic or riparian, but none are considered drought tolerant. To assess their ability to withstand low water, we subjected five Asian temperate and one North American temperate bamboo species to three irrigation treatments: 100%, 50%, and 10% replacement of water lost through evapotranspiration. Plants were irrigated every four days over a 31-day period. Plant response to treatments was measured with stomatal conductance, leaf xylem water potentials, and intrinsic water use efficiency (iWUE). Pleioblastus distichus and Pseudosasa japonica showed significant reductions in conductance between high and low irrigation treatments. Sasa palmata had significantly lower stomatal conductance in all treatments. Pleioblastus chino displayed significantly higher iWUE in the mid irrigation treatment and Arunindaria gigantea displayed significantly lower iWUE than P. chino and S. palmata in the low irrigation treatment. The Asian bamboo species examined here tolerate low water availability and readily acclimate to different soil moisture conditions. Index words: Temperate bamboos, irrigation response, stomatal conductance, intrinsic water use efficiency. Species used in this study: Giant Cane [Arundinaria gigantea (Walt.) Muhl.]; Pleioblastus chino (Franchet & Savatier) Makino; Pleioblastus distichus (Mitford) Nakai; Pseudosasa japonica (Makino); Sasa palmata (Bean) Nakai.

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Limited water availability did not protect poplar saplings from water use efficiency reduction under elevated ozone

Forest Ecology and Management ◽

10.1016/j.foreco.2020.117999 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 462 ◽

pp. 117999 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Yansen Xu ◽

Zhaozhong Feng ◽

Bo Shang ◽

Xiangyang Yuan ◽

Lasse Tarvainen

Keyword(s):

Water Use Efficiency ◽

Water Use ◽

Water Availability ◽

Elevated Ozone ◽

Use Efficiency

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Effects of Drought Frequency on Growth Performance and Transpiration of Young Black Locust (Robinia pseudoacaciaL.)

International Journal of Forestry Research ◽

10.1155/2014/821891 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 2014 ◽

pp. 1-11 ◽

Cited By ~ 12

Author(s):

Dario Mantovani ◽

Maik Veste ◽

Dirk Freese

Keyword(s):

Drought Stress ◽

Drought Tolerance ◽

Water Use Efficiency ◽

Growth Performance ◽

Water Use ◽

Water Availability ◽

Black Locust ◽

Marginal Land ◽

Drought Tolerant ◽

Use Efficiency

Black locust (Robinia pseudoacaciaL.) is a drought-tolerant fast growing tree, which could be an alternative to the more common tree species used in short-rotation coppice on marginal land. The plasticity of black locust in the form of ecophysiological and morphological adaptations to drought is an important precondition for its successful growth in such areas. However, adaptation to drought stress is detrimental to primary production. Furthermore, the soil water availability condition of the initial stage of development may have an impact on the tree resilience. We aimed to investigate the effect of drought stress applied during the resprouting on the drought tolerance of the plant, by examining the black locust growth patterns. We exposed young trees in lysimeters to different cycles of drought. The drought memory affected the plant growth performance and its drought tolerance: the plants resprouting under drought conditions were more drought tolerant than the well-watered ones. Black locust tolerates drastic soil water availability variations without altering its water use efficiency (2.57 g L−1), evaluated under drought stress. Due to its constant water use efficiency and the high phenotypic plasticity, black locust could become an important species to be cultivated on marginal land.

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Carbon–water flux coupling under progressive drought

Biogeosciences ◽

10.5194/bg-16-2557-2019 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 16 (13) ◽

pp. 2557-2572 ◽

Cited By ~ 7

Author(s):

Sven Boese ◽

Martin Jung ◽

Nuno Carvalhais ◽

Adriaan J. Teuling ◽

Markus Reichstein

Keyword(s):

Water Use Efficiency ◽

Soil Water ◽

Water Use ◽

Water Availability ◽

Carbon Assimilation ◽

Soil Water Availability ◽

Natural Experiments ◽

Water Limitation ◽

Dry Down ◽

Use Efficiency

Abstract. Water-use efficiency (WUE), defined as the ratio of carbon assimilation over evapotranspiration (ET), is a key metric to assess ecosystem functioning in response to environmental conditions. It remains unclear which factors control this ratio during periods of extended water limitation. Here, we used dry-down events occurring at eddy-covariance flux tower sites in the FLUXNET database as natural experiments to assess if and how decreasing soil-water availability modifies WUE at ecosystem scale. WUE models were evaluated by their performance to predict ET from both the gross primary productivity (GPP), which characterizes carbon assimilation at ecosystem scale, and environmental variables. We first compared two water-use efficiency models: the first was based on the concept of a constant underlying water-use efficiency, and the second augmented the first with a previously detected direct influence of radiation on transpiration. Both models predicting ET strictly from atmospheric covariates failed to reproduce observed ET dynamics for these periods, as they did not explicitly account for the effect of soil-water limitation. We demonstrate that an ET-attenuating soil-water-availability factor in junction with the additional radiation term was necessary to accurately predict ET flux magnitudes and dry-down lengths of these water-limited periods. In an analysis of the attenuation of ET for the 31 included FLUXNET sites, up to 50 % of the observed decline in ET was due to the soil-water-availability effect we identified in this study. We conclude by noting that the rates of ET decline differ significantly between sites with different vegetation and climate types and discuss the dependency of this rate on the variability of seasonal dryness.

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Effect of water stress on growth, water use efficiency and gas exchange as related to osmotic adjustment of two halophytes Atriplex spp.

Functional Plant Biology ◽

10.1071/fp12245 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 40 (5) ◽

pp. 466 ◽

Cited By ~ 15

Author(s):

Oumelkheir Belkheiri ◽

Maurizio Mulas

Keyword(s):

Water Stress ◽

Water Use Efficiency ◽

Water Use ◽

Osmotic Adjustment ◽

Late Summer ◽

Field Capacity ◽

Dry Weight ◽

Co2 Assimilation ◽

Effect Of Water ◽

Use Efficiency

Atriplex halimus L. is known in the Mediterranean basin and along the coastal areas of Sardinia for its adaptability to salinity, although less information is available on the resistance of this species to water stress in absence of salinity. The effect of water stress on growth and water utilisation was investigated in two Atriplex species: A. halimus originating of south Sardinian island and the exotic species Atriplex nummularia Lindl., originating in Australia and widely used in land restoration of arid areas. Water stress was applied to young plants growing in 20 L pots with a sufficient water reserve to store a potentially sufficient water reserve to maintain substrate near to field capacity (30%) between irrigations. Watering was at 70% (control) or 40% (stress) of field capacity. In order to simulate the grazing by livestock, four plant biomass cuttings were conducted at times T0, T1, T2 and T3, corresponding to one cutting at the end of well watered phase (T0) before water stress induction, two cuttings after cycles of 5 weeks each during full summer (T1) and late summer (T2) and one cutting during autumn (T3). All plants remained alive until the end of treatment although growth was strongly reduced. Leaf dry weight (DW) and water use efficiency (WUE) were determined for all cuttings; relative water content (RWC), turgid weight : dry weight ratio (TW : DW), water potential (Ψw), osmotic potential (Ψs), CO2 assimilation, osmotic adjustment (OA), abscisic acid (ABA) and sugar accumulation were determined for the late summer cutting at T2. Water stress induced a decrease in DW, RWC, Ψw, Ψs, TW : DW and CO2 assimilation for both species, but an increase in WUE expressed in terms of dry matter production and a high accumulation of ABA and total sugars mainly for A. halimus. This suggests a more developed adaptive mechanism in this selection. Indeed, the clone was selected from the southern part of the island, where natural populations of saltbush are more exposed to abiotic stresses, mainly the water stress generated not by salinity. A. nummularia showed a greater OA and a positive net solute accumulation as than A. halimus, suggesting that water stress resistance in A. halimus is linked to a higher WUE rather than a greater osmotic adjustment.

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