Many studies have estimated approximately ranges of thresholds of low soil temperature in the growth and ecophysiological traits of trees, but difficultly determined the exact values. To resolve the problem, black spruce (Picea mariana) and jack pine (Pinus banksiana) seedlings were exposed to 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30 and 35°C soil temperature in greenhouses. After 90 days of the treatment, net photosynthetic rate (A), stomatal conductance (gs), transpiration rate (E), water use efficiency (WUE) and specific leaf area (SLA) were measured. This study showed that all the traits had an asymmetrical peak relationship with changing soil tem- perature, the relationship was well simulated using a cubic curvilinear model, and the exact thresholds could be derived from the second derivative of the model. The results revealed that the thresholds varied among ecophysiological traits and between tree spe- cies. In black spruce, the thresholds were 14.1, 14.7, 10.7, 14.4 and 16.2°C for A, gs, E, WUE and SLA; 15.4, 10.4, 14.7, 16.9 and 10.5°C for the corresponding traits in jack pine. The lowest thresholds of E in black spruce and gs in jack pine were an indicator rep- resenting the minimum requirement of soil temperature for the regular processes of ecophysiology. The highest thresholds of SLA in black spruce and WUE in jack pine suggest they are the most sensitive to decreasing soil temperature and may play an important role in the acclimation. The averaged thresholds were at 14.0 and 13.6°C for black spruce and jack pine, suggesting that the sensitivity of both species to low soil temperature was quite close.
A soil temperature control system was designed for sapling study in alpine region and tested in summer, 2009. The system consisted of a power switch, voltage regulator, microcomputer timer, safety relays, temperature control device, temperature sensors, heating cables, fireproofing plastic pipes (PVC), 108 heavy-duty plastic containers and seedlings. The heating cables were held in six 2-layer PVC frames with 25 cm wide, 320 cm long and 25 cm high and three 1-layer frames with 25 cm wide and 320 cm long for 15°C soil temperature treatment, half of the 2-layer frames were used for 20°C and 25°C soil temperature treatments, respectively. Each of the frames was installed at each of ditches with 30 cm wide, 330 cm long and 30 cm deep in size. 12 seedling containers with 20 cm top diameter, 18cm bottom diameter and 25 cm high were homogenously placed at each of the ditches, and spaces between the containers were filled with natural soil. The system was economic, and could increase soil temperatures obviously and uniformly, the maximal and minimal standard errors of soil temperatures were ±0.28 and ±0.05°C at 10cm depth in the containers within each of all the ditches. In the system, aboveground environment was natural, diurnal and monthly soil temperatures varied with changing air temperature, the research results may be better to know the eco-physiological and growth responses of alpine saplings/seedlings to soil warming than that in greenhouse, laboratory, infrared heat lamp and open top chamber.
The relationships between plant organs and root hydrological traits are not well known and the question arises whether elevated CO2 changes these relationships. This study attempted to answer this question. A pseudo-replicated experiment was conducted with two times 24 American elm(Ulmus americana L.) and 23 and 24 red oak(Quercus rubra L.) seedlings growing in ambient CO2(around 360 μmol·L-1) and 540 ± 7.95 μmol·L-1 CO2 in a greenhouse. After 71 days of treatment for American elm and 77 days for red oak,14 American elm and 12 red oak seedlings from each of the two CO2 levels were randomly selected in order to examine the flow rate of root xylem sap,root hydraulic conductance,total root hydraulic conductivity,fine root and coarse root hydraulic conductivity. All seedlings were harvested to investigate total plant biomass,stem biomass and leaf biomass,leaf area,height,basal diameter,total root biomass,coarse root biomass and fine root biomass. The following conclusions are reached:1) plant organs respond to the elevated CO2 level earlier than hydraulic traits of roots and may gradually lead to changes in hydraulic traits;2) plant organs have different relationships with hydraulic traits of roots and elevated CO2 changes these relationships;the changes may be of importance for plants as means to acclimatize to changing environments;3) biomass of coarse roots increased rather more than that of fine roots;4) Lorentzian and Caussian models are better in estimating the biomass of seedlings than single-variable models.
