Drought response in Scots pine: limited provenance differentiation in NE-Germany

How Scots pine will cope with increasing drought stress under climate change is a key question for forest management. A new study published in Forest Ecology and Management, originating from the manuscript-based M.Sc. thesis of Maike Wegener and conducted in collaboration with the Thünen Institute of Forest Genetics, investigates climate–growth relationships and drought responses of 15 provenances from Central and Eastern Europe. Based on a provenance trial established in 1975 in northeastern Germany, tree-ring analyses show that the influence of late-winter and early-spring temperatures on growth has increased, while the effect of summer temperatures has declined. In contrast, summer water availability remained a consistently important growth driver. Interestingly, no significant differences in drought tolerance were detected among provenances at the study site, and no clear relationship was found between the climatic moisture deficit at the provenance origin and drought response. These findings suggest that provenance differentiation in drought tolerance may be limited under the conditions investigated and highlight the importance of assessments over environmental gradients. The full paper is available here.