Continental Contrasts in Climate Extremes That Control Tree Fecundity

In 2023, more than half of olive harvests (Olea europaea) across Spain, Greece, and Türkiye were lost to drought. The same year late freeze destroyed 90% of the peach crop (Prunus persica) on the Georgia Piedmont and the apple crop (Malus domestica) in central New York, Vermont, and southern Quebec. Climate extremes now rank with the costliest threats to agriculture, but their role in forest recovery from diebacks that are happening globally is unknown for lack of tree fecundity estimates in forests. Tolerance of climate extremes could depend on past exposure but constrained by phylogenetic conservatism. We report a continental scale analysis of climate extremes and forest fecundity across North America and Europe showing that responses to late freeze and drought are happening now. Species differences are not explained by the traits typically included in ecological studies and they are weakly associated with phylogeny. Late freeze, that is, freezing temperatures that follow the onset of flower development in spring, is shown to be "normal" in North America, but not Europe, potentially explaining failed seed production due to delayed onset and the resultant shorter growing period by North American transplants dating back at least to the 18th century. Drought has thus far had the greatest impacts in dry forested regions, but here too, species differences are not explained by traditional trait values. If responses have been buffered from drought and late freeze by past exposure, acclimation and local adaptation prove inadequate as extremes intensify.

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Publication Details

Journal
Global Change Biology
Published
2026-02-01
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.70738
Primary Topic
Plant Physiology and Cultivation Studies
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
0.00

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article

Continental Contrasts in Climate Extremes That Control Tree Fecundity

Emil Cienciala, Tomasz Podgórski, Samantha Sutton, Gregory S. Gilbert et al.
Global Change Biology
Plant Physiology and Cultivation Studies
article

Continental Contrasts in Climate Extremes That Control Tree Fecundity

Emil Cienciala, Tomasz Podgórski, Samantha Sutton, Gregory S. Gilbert, Georg Gratzer, Vladimír Šebeň, Robert A. Andrus, Barbara Seget, S. Lilly Zheng, Fatih Işık, Jalene M. LaMontagne, Shubhi Sharma, Magdalena Żywiec, Peter A. Thomas, Pavel Šamonil, Francesco Chianucci, L. Piechnik, Richard K. Kobe, Mateusz Ledwoń, Lauren S. Jenkins, Valentin Journé, Jill F. Johnstone, Thomas Caignard, Anders Mårell, Maxime Cailleret, Michael C. Dietze, Kyle C. Rodman, Andrew Hacket‐Pain, Chantal D. Reid, Miranda D. Redmond, Arthur Guignabert, Kazuhiko Hoshizaki, M. Fyllas Nikolaos, Jan Holík, Benoı̂t Courbaud, Jacob N. Straub, Mick E. Hanley, James A. Lutz, Georges Künstler, James S. Clark, Irem Sena Kızılaslan, Michael A. Steele, Renzo Garza Motta, Sylvain Delzon, Giorgio Vacchiano, Samuel Venner, Margarita Arianoutsou, Nesibe Köse, Eylul U. Kulah, Alper K. Kadıoğlu, Michal Bogdziewicz, Arndt Hampe, Rafael Calama, Jaroslaw Socha, J. A. Myers, Tong Qiu, Inés Ibáñez, Miguel A. Zavala, J. Julio Camarero, Bruno Fady, Kira Meyer, Ignacio M. Pérez‐Ramos, Miao Hu, Thomas A. Nagel, Francisco Rodriguez‐Sánchez, Thomas Boivin, Raul Bonal, Marie‐Claude Venner, Renata Poulton‐Kamakura, Yves Bergeron, Verónica Loewe‐Muñoz, Davide Ascoli, Josep‐Maria Espelta, Aleksi Lehtonen, Emily Moran
article en

Abstract

In 2023, more than half of olive harvests (Olea europaea) across Spain, Greece, and Türkiye were lost to drought. The same year late freeze destroyed 90% of the peach crop (Prunus persica) on the Georgia Piedmont and the apple crop (Malus domestica) in central New York, Vermont, and southern Quebec. Climate extremes now rank with the costliest threats to agriculture, but their role in forest recovery from diebacks that are happening globally is unknown for lack of tree fecundity estimates in forests. Tolerance of climate extremes could depend on past exposure but constrained by phylogenetic conservatism. We report a continental scale analysis of climate extremes and forest fecundity across North America and Europe showing that responses to late freeze and drought are happening now. Species differences are not explained by the traits typically included in ecological studies and they are weakly associated with phylogeny. Late freeze, that is, freezing temperatures that follow the onset of flower development in spring, is shown to be "normal" in North America, but not Europe, potentially explaining failed seed production due to delayed onset and the resultant shorter growing period by North American transplants dating back at least to the 18th century. Drought has thus far had the greatest impacts in dry forested regions, but here too, species differences are not explained by traditional trait values. If responses have been buffered from drought and late freeze by past exposure, acclimation and local adaptation prove inadequate as extremes intensify.

Global Change BiologyVol. 32(2)
Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 (FR), Boston University (US), Universidad Complutense de Madrid (ES), Utah State University (US), Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR), University of Alaska Fairbanks (US), University of Liverpool (GB), Université de Bordeaux (FR), University of Ljubljana (SI), University of California, Merced (US), Université du Québec à Montréal (CA), Wilkes University (US), Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile (CL), Duke University (US), University of California, Santa Cruz (US), University of Milan (IT), Universidad de Alcalá (ES), Université du Québec en Abitibi-Témiscamingue (CA), National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (GR), Northern Arizona University (US), Washington University in St. Louis (US), Czech University of Life Sciences Prague (CZ), University of Missouri–St. Louis (US), Aix-Marseille Université (FR), University of Michigan (US), Mammal Research Institute (PL), Natural Resources Institute Finland (FI), University of Agriculture in Krakow (PL), Yale University (US), ETH Zurich (CH), Institut National de Recherche pour l'Agriculture, l'Alimentation et l'Environnement (FR), Institute for Biomedical Engineering (CH), Adif (Spain) (ES), Santé et Agroécologie du Vignoble (FR), Biotechnical Educational Centre Ljubljana (SI), Centre de Recherche et d’Enseignement de Géosciences de l’Environnement (FR), Istanbul University-Cerrahpaşa (TR), Czech Academy of Sciences, Global Change Research Institute (CZ), Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire de Physique (FR), Institute of Forest Ecosystem Research (CZ), Écologie des Forêts Méditerranéennes (FR), Forestry Research Centre (IT), National Forest Centre (SK), Swiss Integrative Center for Human Health (CH), Instituto Pirenaico de Ecología (ES), Torino e-district (IT), Centre for Research on Ecology and Forestry Applications (ES), Instituto Profesional de Chile (CL), Unité mixte de recherche Œnologie (FR), Laboratoire de Biométrie et Biologie Evolutive (FR), Frontier Science Foundation-Hellas (GR), Instituto de Recursos Naturales y Agrobiología de Sevilla (ES), UMR BIOdiversity, GEnes & Communities (FR), Władysław Szafer Institute of Botany (PL), Institute of Systematics and Evolution of Animals (PL), SUNY Brockport (US), Akita Prefectural University (JP), University of Turin (IT), Keele University (GB), Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań (PL), Istanbul University (TR), Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University (CN), Washington State University (US), Universidad de Sevilla (ES), University of Plymouth (GB), Université Grenoble Alpes (FR), BOKU University (AT), University of California, Berkeley (US), Polish Academy of Sciences (PL)
National Science Foundation, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, European Commission, Agencia Nacional de Investigación y Desarrollo
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