Seasonal water use by deciduous and evergreen woody species in a scrub community is based on water availability and root distribution

Ellsworth, Patrick Z.; Sternberg, L. O.

doi:10.1002/eco.1523

Cited by 105 publications

(77 citation statements)

References 64 publications

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“…However, several isotope studies have shown that the root water uptake profile does not coincide with the root distribution if plants experience water stress (e.g. Kulmatiski and Beard, 2013;Ellsworth and Sternberg, 2015;Volkmann et al, 2016). Hydraulic lift can further increase the complexity of soil-plant interaction, as experimentally observed and implemented in a soil hydraulic model by Meunier et al (2018).…”

Section: Limitations and Outlookmentioning

confidence: 99%

Water ages in the critical zone of long-term experimental sites in northern latitudes

Sprenger¹,

Tetzlaff

Buttle

et al. 2018

Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci.

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Abstract. As northern environments undergo intense changes due to a warming climate and altered land use practices, there is an urgent need for improved understanding of the impact of atmospheric forcing and vegetation on water storage and flux dynamics in the critical zone. We therefore assess the age dynamics of water stored in the upper 50 cm of soil, and in evaporation, transpiration, or recharge fluxes at four soil-vegetation units of podzolic soils in the northern latitudes with either heather or tree vegetation (Bruntland Burn in Scotland, Dorset in Canada, and Krycklan in Sweden). We derived the age dynamics with the physically based SWIS (Soil Water Isotope Simulator) model, which has been successfully used to simulate the hydrometric and isotopic dynamics in the upper 50 cm of soils at the study sites. The modelled subsurface was divided into interacting fast and slow flow domains. We tracked each day's infiltrated water through the critical zone and derived forward median travel times (which show how long the water takes to leave the soil via evaporation, transpiration, or recharge), and median water ages (to estimate the median age of water in soil storage or the evaporation, transpiration, and recharge fluxes). Resulting median travel times were time-variant, mainly governed by major recharge events during snowmelt in Dorset and Krycklan or during the wetter winter conditions in Bruntland Burn. Transpiration travel times were driven by the vegetation growth period with the longest travel times (200 days) for waters infiltrated in early dormancy and the shortest travel times during the vegetation period. However, long tails of the travel time distributions in evaporation and transpiration revealed that these fluxes comprised waters older than 100 days. At each study site, water ages of soil storage, evaporation, transpiration, and recharge were all inversely related to the storage volume of the critical zone: water ages generally decreased exponentially with increasing soil water storage. During wet periods, young soil waters were more likely to be evapotranspired and recharged than during drier periods. While the water in the slow flow domain showed longterm seasonal dynamics and generally old water ages, the water ages of the fast flow domain were generally younger and much flashier. Our results provide new insights into the mixing and transport processes of soil water in the upper layer of the critical zone, which is relevant for hydrological modelling at the plot to catchment scales as the common assumption of a well-mixed system in the subsurface holds for neither the evaporation, transpiration, or recharge.

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Section: Limitations and Outlookmentioning

confidence: 99%

Water ages in the critical zone of long-term experimental sites in northern latitudes

Sprenger¹,

Tetzlaff

Buttle

et al. 2018

Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Thus, the assumption of a linear decrease in root water uptake with depth appears to be reasonable for the current study sites. However, several isotope studies have shown that, the root water uptake profile does not coincide with the root distribution if plants experience water stress (e.g., Kulmatiski and Beard, 2013;Ellsworth and Sternberg, 2015;Volkmann et al, 2016). Hydraulic lift 5 can further increase the complexity of soil-plant interaction, as experimentally observed and implemented in a soil hydraulic model by Meunier et al (2018).…”

Section: Limitations and Outlookmentioning

confidence: 99%

Water ages in the critical zone of long-term experimental sites in northern latitudes

Sprenger¹,

Tetzlaff²,

Buttle³

et al. 2018

Preprint

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Abstract. As northern environments undergo intense respond due to a warming climate and altered land use practices, there is an urgent need for improved understanding of the impact of atmospheric forcing and vegetation on water storage and flux dynamics in the critical zone. We therefore assess the age dynamics of water stored in the upper 50 15 cm of soil, and in evaporation, transpiration or recharge fluxes at four soil-vegetation units of podzolic soils in the northern latitudes with either heather or tree vegetation (Bruntland Burn in Scotland, Dorset in Canada, and Krycklan in Sweden). We derived the age dynamics with the physically based SWIS (Soil Water Isotope Simulator) model, which has been successfully used to simulate the hydrometric and isotopic dynamics in the upper 50 cm of soils at the study sites. The modelled subsurface was divided into interacting fast and slow flow domains. We tracked each day's 20 infiltrated water through the critical zone and derived forward median travel times (which show how long the water takes to leave the soil via evaporation, transpiration or recharge), and median water ages (to estimate the median age of water in soil storage or the evaporation, transpiration and recharge fluxes). Resulting median travel times were time-variant, mainly governed by major recharge events during snow melt in Dorset and Krycklan or during the wetter winter conditions in Bruntland Burn. Transpiration travel times were driven by the vegetation growth period with 25 longest travel times (200 days) for waters infiltrated in early dormancy and shortest travel times during the vegetation period. However, long tails of the travel time distributions in evaporation and transpiration revealed that these fluxes comprised waters older than 100 days. At each study site, water ages of soil storage, evaporation, transpiration and recharge were all inversely related to the storage volume of the critical zone: water ages generally decreased exponentially with increasing soil water storage. During wet periods, young soil waters were more likely to be 30 evapotranspired and recharged than during drier periods. While the water in the slow flow domain showed long-term seasonal dynamics and generally old water ages, the water ages of the fast flow domain were generally younger and much flashier. Our results provide new insights into the mixing and transport processes of soil water in the upper layer of the critical zone, which is relevant for hydrological modelling at the plot to catchment scales as the common assumption of a well-mixed system in the subsurface neither holds for the evaporation, transpiration nor recharge. 35Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2018-144 Manuscript under review for journal Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discussion started: 27 March 2018 c Author(s) 2018. CC BY 4.0 License. 2 IntroductionWater ages are useful metrics to assess hydrological processes as they reveal interactions between storage and fluxes of water in a hydrological system (Hrachowitz et al.,...

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“…This fundamental understanding of water uptake and transport from roots to shoots underlies the utility of stable isotopes in plant water uptake investigations17. While many site-based studies have now been completed18192021222324252627282930313233343536373839404142434445464748495051525354555657585960616263646566676869707172737475767778798081828384858687888990919293949596979899100101102103104105106107108109110111112113114…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Prevalence and magnitude of groundwater use by vegetation: a global stable isotope meta-analysis

Evaristo

McDonnell

2017

Sci Rep

130

111

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The role of groundwater as a resource in sustaining terrestrial vegetation is widely recognized. But the global prevalence and magnitude of groundwater use by vegetation is unknown. Here we perform a meta-analysis of plant xylem water stable isotope (δ2H and δ18O, n = 7367) information from 138 published papers – representing 251 genera, and 414 species of angiosperms (n = 376) and gymnosperms (n = 38). We show that the prevalence of groundwater use by vegetation (defined as the number of samples out of a universe of plant samples reported to have groundwater contribution to xylem water) is 37% (95% confidence interval, 28–46%). This is across 162 sites and 12 terrestrial biomes (89% of heterogeneity explained; Q-value = 1235; P < 0.0001). However, the magnitude of groundwater source contribution to the xylem water mixture (defined as the proportion of groundwater contribution in xylem water) is limited to 23% (95% CI, 20–26%; 95% prediction interval, 3–77%). Spatial analysis shows that the magnitude of groundwater source contribution increases with aridity. Our results suggest that while groundwater influence is globally prevalent, its proportional contribution to the total terrestrial transpiration is limited.

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Seasonal water use by deciduous and evergreen woody species in a scrub community is based on water availability and root distribution

Cited by 105 publications

References 64 publications

Water ages in the critical zone of long-term experimental sites in northern latitudes

Water ages in the critical zone of long-term experimental sites in northern latitudes

Water ages in the critical zone of long-term experimental sites in northern latitudes

Prevalence and magnitude of groundwater use by vegetation: a global stable isotope meta-analysis

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