DENDROCLIMATOLOGICAL ASSESSMENT OF Adesmia pinifolia IN THE CENTRAL ANDES HIGHLAND

HADAD MARTÍN; EDGARDO MELIÁN; ROMERO EVANGELINA; GALLARDO, VERÓNICA; RIBAS FERNÁNDEZ, YANINA; FLORES DANIEL

San Juan

Congreso; XLI Reunión Científica Anual de la Sociedad de Biología de Cuyo; 2023

Recent studies indicate the large potential of shrubs to extract dendroecological information in large areas of the planet whose vegetation cover is restricted to this biological form. Highland ecosystems of western Central Andes are currently poorly represented by dendrochronologicalinformation. This study objectives were to analysed the dendroclimatic potential of Adesmia pinifolia shrub and to recognize its growth dependence to climate in semi-arid areas of the central-western Central Andes. Wood cross-sections were calculated from living and dead individuals in the three sites. Sampled shrubs were randomly selected. In the laboratory, the traditional dendrochronological technique was applied. The tree ring growth were compared with climatic variable (temperature, precipitation, standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index (SPEI) and soil moisture. Data were extracted from the Climatic Research Unit gridded dataset (CRU TS 4.01). One site showed a strong positive and significant relationship with mean temperature. The tree ring chronologies showed a negative relationship with sea surface temperatures from the Tropical Pacific, suggesting teleconnections with El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon. Two sites record a strong hydroclimatic signal recorded in the tree ring growth of A. pinifolia (SPEI and soil moisture). We reconstructed the soil moisture of December for the last 400 years. Shrub is an important component of highland ecosystems in areas without trees. Therefore, the dendroclimatic shrubs studies are essential to understand the effects of climate and human factors on these ecosystems. To build a network of shrubs growth ring chronologies from different sectors of the Central Andes is posed as a challenge to understand the paleoclimatic history of the Central Andes, where paleoclimate data are scarce.