Compartmentalization, Resource Allocation, and Wood Quality

Abstract

The concept of a trade-off of tree resources between growth and defense is readily grasped. The most detailed development of the concept is for the growth-differentiation balance hypothesis that predicts that resources for normal growth and primary metabolism are diverted to support plant defense and secondary or stress metabolism. This hypothesis has been applied to the biosynthetic cost of stress metabolites that protect wood and foliage from herbivory. This review suggests that the trade-offs of primary to stress metabolism is an ongoing theme throughout the evolution of land plants. This review extends the concept of the growth/defense trade-off to processes of apoptosis in the constitutive development of tracheary elements and heartwood as well as to the induced boundary-setting processes of compartmentalization of decay in living trees. For wood utilization, the confusion of heartwood with wound-initiated discoloration continues to obscure the sources of value loss, particularly for high-value hardwood lumber. Examples are drawn from the anatomical effects of tree injury from fire, storms, and vascular wilt disease.

An experimental assessment of the impact of drought and fire on western larch injury, mortality and recovery

“…Current hypotheses for fire-induced mortality of larger trees, such as xylem dysfunction (Michaletz 2018), have been demonstrated on excised branches in laboratory water-bath experiments (Michaletz et al 2012;West et al 2016;Bär et al 2018). In terms of natural forest fires, there is evidence that fires impair large-tree xylem hydraulics (Smith 2015;Smith et al 2016b;Bär et al 2018) and evidence that fires do not affect xylem hydraulics (Battipaglia et al 2016;Thompson et al 2017). Experiments that incorporate a range of tree sizes and tree-scale treatments ) and physiology measurements are needed for an improved understanding of size-dependent mortality (McDowell et al 2018).…”

A Review on the Dynamics of Prescribed Fire, Tree Mortality, and Injury in Managing Oak Natural Communities to Minimize Economic Loss in North America

“…Trees with faster rates of diameter growth are able to close open wounds sooner, thus minimizing the time the wound face is available for fungal colonization. By sealing the wound, the tree also creates an unfavorable anaerobic environment for wood decay organisms, most of whom are aerobic [105,109]. High rates of diameter growth more rapidly restore structural support in the tree's bole and vascular cambial functioning after fire scarring of the bole [73,109].…”

“…By sealing the wound, the tree also creates an unfavorable anaerobic environment for wood decay organisms, most of whom are aerobic [105,109]. High rates of diameter growth more rapidly restore structural support in the tree's bole and vascular cambial functioning after fire scarring of the bole [73,109]. Growth near the area of injury (wound wood ribs) can be faster than on other portions of the bole [71].…”

“…Compartmentalization is a process whereby trees are able to establish a protective boundary surrounding cells injured by fire [109] (Figure 2D). The boundary is the result of the formation of tyloses and production of waxes, gums, and resins to form a barrier that inhibits cell desiccation and microbial infection.…”

Vulnerability of tropical forest ecosystems and forest dependent communities to droughts

“…Therefore, NPP can potentially reflect whether a forest is competitively fit and whether a species may be more adaptable to a changing environment and stresses (Vogt et al 1996). NPP could also be used to index plant adaptation and response to a changing environment or physiological adaptation of species to drought, soils, insects and pests (Waring 1991 Smith 2015). Thus by determining how much biomass a specific landscape produces each year and obtaining information on the amount of ecosystem services (e.g., habitats, water, nutrient cycles, forest products, biodiversity) collected by a group of people, it becomes possible to estimate whether a landscape is capable of sustainably supporting both activities.…”