Forest Mortality in High-Elevation Pine Forests of Eastern California, USA; Influence of Climatic Water Deficit

Widespread mortality in high-elevation forests has been increasing across western North American mountains in recent years, with climate, insects, and disease the primary causes. Subalpine forests in the eastern Sierra Nevada, by contrast, have experienced far less mortality than other ranges, and mortality events have been patchy and episodic. This situation, and lack of significant effect of non-native white-pine blister rust, enable investigation of fine-scale response of two subalpine Sierran species, whitebark pine (Pinus albicaulis, PiAl) and limber pine (P. flexilis, PiFl), to climate variability, in particular, climatic water deficit (CWD). We report similarities and differences between the two major mortality events in these pines in the last 150 years: 1988-1992 for PiFl and 2006-ongoing for PiAl. The ultimate cause of tree death was mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae), with climatic factors pre-conditioning stress in both species. Our studies include intensive ecology-plot analyses (both species) and region-wide air-survey forest-mortality detection mapping (PiAl only). We used climatic data from historic weather station data; for CWD, we modeled values from PRISM regional climate projections downscaled to 270 m and applied these to a regional water-balance model. The strongest correlations of ring-width (a measure of tree growth) in both species to climatic variables were to CWD: PiFl, -0.29 and -0.54 for live and dead trees, respectively; PiAl ,-0.19 for both live and dead trees. Correlations of ring-widths to 2-year lagged CWD were higher than to current-year means: PiFl, -0.34 and -0.44 for live and dead trees, respectively; PiAl, -0.43 and -0.46, live and dead trees, respectively. Mean annual CWD values of the mortality plots in the intensive study were 181 mm (PiAl) and 289 mm (PiFl); air surveys showed significantly higher CWD values for PiAl mortality stands than live forests (387 mm and 307 mm, respectively). Correlations of growth to other climatic variables were weaker but significant. In PiFl these were to water-year precipitation and minimum temperature; for PiAl, they were to water-year precipitation. The strength of CWD relationships with forest mortality in two subalpine pine species suggests important physiological processes interacting with soil moisture that may be predictive in evaluating forest health under changing climates.