Global warming reduces the carrying capacity of the tallest angiosperm species (Eucalyptus regnans)

Raphaël Trouvé (), Patrick J. Baker, Mark J. Ducey, Andrew P. Robinson and Craig R. Nitschke
Additional contact information
Raphaël Trouvé: Food and Ecosystem Sciences
Patrick J. Baker: Food and Ecosystem Sciences
Mark J. Ducey: Department of Natural Resources and the Environment
Andrew P. Robinson: CEBRA & School of BioSciences
Craig R. Nitschke: Food and Ecosystem Sciences

Nature Communications, 2025, vol. 16, issue 1, 1-10

Abstract: Abstract Rising temperatures and increased frequency and intensity of droughts and heat waves have affected tree mortality rates worldwide. Here, we investigate how these changes have affected the carrying capacity of mountain ash forests (Eucalyptus regnans), the world’s tallest flowering plant and one of the most carbon-dense forests on earth. We analyze data from a large network of silvicultural experiments collected between 1947 and 2000 in southeastern Australia to identify trends in mortality rates and carrying capacity for the species, and to quantify how these changes relate to spatiotemporal variations in climate. We show that forests growing in the warmest and highest vapor pressure deficit conditions had the lowest carrying capacity, and this capacity further decreased with rising temperatures. Key findings indicate that a projected three °C increase in temperature by 2080 could reduce tree density and carbon stock in these forests by 24%, equivalent to losing 240,000 hectares of mature mountain ash forests. Trees that died were 0.62 times the size of living trees (i.e., they were suppressed), with no detectable effect of climate on this ratio. We discuss the implications for forest conservation and management, and how reduced carrying capacity could undermine global forest restoration and carbon sequestration efforts.

Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-025-62535-x Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:16:y:2025:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-025-62535-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-025-62535-x

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().