Bamboo ( Bambusa emeiensis ) leaf phytolith records in response to weather variability during 2017 in central China

Abstract

With the growth of global change research, it is crucial to reveal the relationship among modern phytoliths and climatic factors. The physiological responses of plants to climatic factors such as temperature, evaporation, and precipitation are still unclear. Here we used Bambusa emeiensis leaf phytoliths to explore the relationship among modern phytolith assemblages, sizes, and its controlling climatic factors. A total of 37 leaf samples were collected at a sampling interval of 10 days. Phytolith types, assemblages and sizes data were subjected to Analysis of Variance (ANOVA), along with cluster analysis, correlation and redundancy analysis (RDA). Four phytolith assemblages zones together with climatic indices exhibited distinct responses the climatic phases ranging from cold-dry to warm-humid, mild-humid and cold-dry. Correlation analysis showed that warmth index (Iw), short-long cell ratio (SL), sensitive index (SF) had positive relationship with 10-day mean temperature (R² = 0.85, 0.56, 0.87, p = 0.001, 0.001, 0.001), and evaporation (R² = 0.74, 0.42, 0.72, p = 0.001, 0.008, 0.001) and precipitation (R² = 0.33, 0.33, 0.39, p = 0.04, 0.04, 0.01), respectively. However, the phytolith sizes showed significantly negative relationship with 10-day mean temperature and evaporation. The RDA analysis revealed that evaporation and temperature had the same effect on the phytolith assemblages and sizes. Our results suggested that modern phytolith records are reliable indicators for environmental changes.