Growth Responses of Baldcypress to Wastewater Nutrient Additions and Changing Hydrologic Regime

We used tree-ring analysis to evaluate the combined effects of rising water levels and 13 years of municipal wastewater addition on growth of baldcypress in a subsiding swamp forest in southern Louisiana. Trees in the treatment, downstream outflow, and adjacent untreated control areas all experience...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Wetlands (Wilmington, N.C.) N.C.), 2012-02, Vol.32 (1), p.95-103
Main Authors: Keim, Richard F., Izdepski, Caleb W., Day, John W.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Biomedical and Life Sciences
Canals
Coastal Sciences
Dendrochronology
Ecology
Effluents
Environmental Management
Floods
Freshwater & Marine Ecology
Hydrogeology
Hydrologic regime
Landscape Ecology
Life Sciences
Municipal wastewater
Nutrients
Outflow
Productivity
Subsidence
Taxodium distichum
Tree rings
Trees
Wastewater treatment
Water levels
Water treatment
Wetlands
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:We used tree-ring analysis to evaluate the combined effects of rising water levels and 13 years of municipal wastewater addition on growth of baldcypress in a subsiding swamp forest in southern Louisiana. Trees in the treatment, downstream outflow, and adjacent untreated control areas all experienced increased growth coinciding with a period of widespread rapid subsidence and water-level increases in the late 1960s. Tree growth in the treatment and outflow sites began to decrease before wastewater application began in 1992, and afterward was apparently unaffected by treatment. In contrast, trees in the control site have not experienced growth declines. Hydrological changes caused by subsidence have apparently overwhelmed any effect of wastewater treatment on baldcypress growth. Increasing inundation may have increased growth initially by eliminating competition from species less tolerant of inundation; however, after a decade of sustained higher water, growth declined steadily. Release of baldcypress from competition continues at the topographically higher control site, but growth will likely subsequently decrease as ongoing subsidence and eustatic sea-level rise cause more prolonged inundation. We conclude that short-term increases in water level stimulated growth of baldcypress, but long-term increased inundation was a net stressor and was more important than nutrient limitations in controlling growth at this site.
ISSN:0277-5212
1943-6246
DOI:10.1007/s13157-011-0248-6