Functional thresholds of plant resistance and recovery to drought

Abstract

With ongoing climate change, the predicted increase in climate variability is likely to increase the intensity of extreme drought events. This could significantly amplify the consequences of drought, because ecological responses are often non-linear. The importance of functional thresholds has been widely recognized, where comparably small changes in the stressor can have disproportional large consequences for ecosystem functioning. However, very few studies have actually tested for the functional thresholds of drought responses, which creates large uncertainties in our understanding of drought effects. Here, we aimed to determine the effects of drought intensity on plant productivity and to identify potential thresholds underpinning these responses.