Future Bloom and Blossom Frost Risk for Malus domestica Considering Climate Model and Impact Model Uncertainties

Abstract

The future bloom and risk of blossom frosts for Malus domestica were projected using regional climate realizations and phenological ( = impact) models. As climate impact projections are susceptible to uncertainties of climate and impact models and model concatenation, the significant horizon of the climate impact signal was analyzed by applying 7 impact models, including two new developments, on 13 climate realizations of the IPCC emission scenario A1B. Advancement of phenophases and a decrease in blossom frost risk for Lower Saxony (Germany) for early and late ripeners was determined by six out of seven phenological models. Single model/single grid point time series of bloom showed significant trends by 2021–2050 compared to 1971–2000, whereas the joint signal of all climate and impact models did not stabilize until 2043. Regarding blossom frost risk, joint projection variability exceeded the projected signal. Thus, blossom frost risk cannot be stated to be lower by the end of the 21st century despite a negative trend. As a consequence it is however unlikely to increase. Uncertainty of temperature, blooming date and blossom frost risk projection reached a minimum at 2078–2087. The projected phenophases advanced by 5.5 d K−1, showing partial compensation of delayed fulfillment of the winter chill requirement and faster completion of the following forcing phase in spring. Finally, phenological model performance was improved by considering the length of day.

Future climate change impacts on apple flowering date in a Mediterranean subbasin

“…'Brookfield Gala' model presented the best validation statistics (2.94 days). These RMSE values are similar to others in the literature for apple and other fruit trees blooming or budburst modeling studies and can be considered fairly precise for this kind of models (Luedeling, 2012): 4-6 days (Legave et al, 2013), 1.2-6.3 (Rea and Eccel, 2006) and 3.2-5.7 (Hoffmann and Rath, 2013) for apples, 4 days for peach trees (Miranda et al, 2013) and even wider ranges (4.7-29.8) for pear, cherry and kiwifruits (Cesaraccio et al, 2004).…”

“…Moreover, other studies have verified flowering advancements in the recent past for apple together with pear and other temperate fruits in South Africa (Grab and Craparo, 2011), Australia (Darbyshire et al, 2013), New Zealand (Clothier et al, 2012), Germany (Blanke and Kunz, 2009;Estrella et al, 2007), France (Guedon and Legave, 2008), and Central Europe (Menzel et al, 2006). Other studies using climate model projections showed also advancements of apple or other temperate fruits: apple in North Italy (Eccel et al, 2009) and Germany (Hoffmann and Rath, 2013), fruit trees in general in Central Europe (Trnka et al, 2011), grapevine in France for the end of the Century (García de Cortázar Atauri, 2006) and in Australia for mid century (Webb et al, 2007;Darbyshire et al, 2014). On the other hand, other authors found delays in the beginning of chill accumulation and fulfillment of CR, which should lead to later flowering (Luedeling et al, 2013).…”

Response of maize and olive to climate change under the semi-arid conditions of southern Spain

“…Also, in this study the ensemble of climate models used was ENS-Spain02, especially developed for impact assessment . In spite of the low uncertainty detected, this one was slightly higher for future periods compared with the baseline due to inherent uncertainty of the climate models and was in agreement to Ferrise et al (2011) and Hoffmann and Rath (2013).…”

“…This is one of the largest uncertainty sources in climate change impact assessment as Iglesias et al (2010) for olive, Hoffmann and Rath (2013) for apple, Ruiz-Ramos and Mínguez (2010) and Asseng et al (2013) for wheat and maize described. However there are other relevant uncertainty sources not addressed here, as driving GCM, climate scenarios and others decisions related to climate .…”

Unique challenges and opportunities for northeastern US crop production in a changing climate

“…In an apple phenology modeling study in Germany, Hoffmann and Rath (2013) found a decrease in frost risk for flowers in six out of seven model projections with the A1B emissions scenario despite an acceleration of first bloom date of 5.5 days C −1…”