Slower growth prior to the 2018 drought and a high growth sensitivity to previous year summer conditions predisposed European beech to crown dieback.

The record-breaking drought in 2018 caused premature leaf discoloration and shedding (early browning) in many beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) dominated forests in Central Europe. However, a high degree of variability in drought response among individual beech trees was observed. While some trees were severely impacted by the prolonged water deficits and high temperatures, others remained vital with no or only minor signs of crown vitality loss. Why some beech trees were more susceptible to drought-induced crown damage than others and whether growth recovery is possible are poorly understood. Here, we aimed to identify growth characteristics associated with the variability in drought response between individual beech trees based on a sample of 470 trees in northern Switzerland. By combining tree growth measurements and crown condition assessments, we also investigated the possible link between crown dieback and growth recovery after drought. Beech trees with early browning exhibited an overall lower growth vigor before the 2018 drought than co-occurring vital beech trees. This lower vigor is mainly indicated by lower overall growth rates, stronger growth declines in the past decades, and higher growth-climate sensitivity. Particularly, warm previous year summer conditions negatively affected current growth of the early-browning trees. These findings suggest that the affected trees had less access to critical resources and were physiologically limited in their growth predisposing them to early browning. Following the 2018 drought, observed growth recovery potential corresponded to the amount of crown dieback and the local climatic water balance. Overall, our findings emphasize that beech-dominated forests in Central Europe are under increasing pressure from severe droughts, ultimately reducing the competitive ability of this species, especially on lowland sites with shallow soils and low water holding capacity

Long-term growth decline precedes sudden crown dieback of European beech

European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) has strongly suffered from the exceptional 2018 drought and subsequent dry years that hit Central Europe. While many trees showed severe signs of crown dieback or died following the 2018 extreme drought, other co-occurring and neighboring trees showed no sign of dieback or only minor damage. The reasons why some trees were more severely impacted than others and which predisposing factors make some trees more vulnerable than others are still poorly understood. Here, we analyzed differences in long-term growth trends, neighborhood composition (competition and species diversity), early-warning signals, and growth responses to past severe droughts of co-occurring vital and severely declining beech trees at six sites in Switzerland. We aimed to connect tree vitality after 2018 with past long-term growth trajectories and investigated whether declining trees had already been more susceptible to drought than vital trees before dieback occurred. Overall, trees that showed severe crown dieback had a stronger growth decline than vital trees in the last 50 years. Declining trees exhibited stagnating and then decreasing growth trajectories even before signs of crown dieback occurred. Interestingly, we did not find significant differences in growth response to past severe droughts between the vitality classes, with the exception that vital trees recovered faster from past more severe droughts. Further, we could neither detect any difference in the effect of competition and neighborhood species composition on growth response, nor predict crown dieback based on early-warning signals which try to predict regime shifts by sudden changes in the autoregressive coefficient with lag 1, standard deviation and skewness. Our results indicate that unlike vital trees, declining beech trees showed predisposing signs for crown dieback by having lower growth rates during the last 50 years.ISSN:0168-1923ISSN:1873-224