Correlation between leaf size and hydraulic architecture in five compound-leaved tree species of a temperate forest in NE China

Abstract

The divergence between simple and compound leaf form is a fundamental division in leaf architecture that has great impact on environmental adaptations of plants. Two hypotheses regarding the adaptive significance of compound leaf form have long been hypothesized: (1) it enables trees to have higher growth rates under favorable environmental conditions; (2) it contributes to better adaptation to seasonal and unpredictable drought stresses since dropping the whole leaf units could function as a protective mechanism of hydraulic segmentation and hence avoiding diebacks of the more carbon costly stems. These hypotheses, however, have not been firmly supported by mechanistic studies on the underlying physiology and more importantly the inter-specific variations within this functional group in relation to these two proposed hypotheses have largely been overlooked. In the present study, using a common garden setup we investigated the impact of leaf size, an important characteristic of leaf architecture, on xylem hydraulics and carbon economy of five commonly found sympatric compound-leaved tree species from a typical temperate forest of NE China. We specifically tested the hypotheses that larger compound leaf size would be associated with higher hydraulic conductance, increased efficiency of carbon assimilation and greater degree of hydraulic segmentation. Our results showed that the majority of the hydraulic resistance in shoots was allocated to leaf lamina (53–77% among the five species) and the compound leaf petiole only accounts for a small portion of the shoot hydraulic resistance (9–24%). Both stem hydraulic conductivity and whole-shoot hydraulic conductance showed strong positive correlations with compound leaf size contributing to significantly higher carbon assimilation efficiency in species with larger leaf sizes. The magnitude of water potential drop across transpiring leaves showed a strong positive correlation with leaf size resulting in less negative stem xylem water potential in species with larger leaf sizes, which supports our hypothesis that larger compound leaf enhances hydraulic segmentation. Our results also showed that the advantages associated with larger leaf size can be traded off by a greater susceptibility to freeze-thaw induced hydraulic dysfunction. Besides a deeper understanding of the environmental adaptation of compound-leaved tree species, these findings may contribute to a better utilization of this important type of trees in forestry.