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Abstract

Central European forests experienced high rates of air pollution in the second half of the 20th century, especially along the borders of Czechia, Germany and Poland. Consequently, tree-growth declines were detected in heavily polluted forests. However, information about how pollution has influenced growth-climate responses beyond tree-ring width (RW) in pollution-affected forests remains sparse. In this study, we investigated the impact of high-level pollution during 1960s-1980s in Central Europe on the climatic signals of various tree-ring parameters of Norway spruce, including RW, latewood Blue Intensity (LWBI), and maximum cell wall thickness (CWT), to understand how tree growth and climatic sensitivity were affected. Tree-ring cores were collected from six temperature-limited high-elevation sites within four pollution-affected regions in Czechia and northern Slovakia. RW and LWBI were measured for all samples and CWT was produced from two sites with contrasting pollution impacts. Distinct pollution-related RW growth suppression was detected in 1970s to 1980s at several sites. LWBI and CWT chronologies were highly correlated (r LWBI = 0.52-0.75; r CWT = 0.63-0.68) with growing season (April-September) temperature and did not exhibit clear signs of distortion by pollution compared to RW (r RW = 0.28-0.58). Pollution stress seemed to reduce tree growth by decreasing cell numbers and made RW less sensitive to climate. This study reveals that impacts of pollution on different tree-ring parameters varied which can further influence their climatic sensitivities. It provides valuable insight in improving the utility of pollution-affected tree-ring chronologies by choosing appropriate parameters, which can ultimately contribute to substantially improving the calibration of climate reconstructions from heavily polluted regions.

Keywords

Latewood blue intensity; Quantitative wood anatomy; Sulfur/nitrogen deposition; Non-climatic impacts; Climatic signal; Maximum cell wall thickness

Published in

Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
2025, volume: 372, article number: 110725
Publisher: ELSEVIER

SLU Authors

UKÄ Subject classification

Environmental Sciences
Forest Science

Publication identifier

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agrformet.2025.110725

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/143096