Low‐cost observations and experiments return a high value in plant phenology research
Plant ecologists in the Anthropocene are tasked with documenting, interpreting, and predicting how plants respond to environmental change. Phenology, the timing of seasonal biological events including leaf‐out, flowering, fruiting, and leaf senescence, is among the most visible and oft‐recorded face...
Autores principales: | , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
John Wiley and Sons Inc.
2020
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7186900/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32351799 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/aps3.11338 |
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author | McDonough MacKenzie, Caitlin Gallinat, Amanda S. Zipf, Lucy |
author_facet | McDonough MacKenzie, Caitlin Gallinat, Amanda S. Zipf, Lucy |
author_sort | McDonough MacKenzie, Caitlin |
collection | PubMed |
description | Plant ecologists in the Anthropocene are tasked with documenting, interpreting, and predicting how plants respond to environmental change. Phenology, the timing of seasonal biological events including leaf‐out, flowering, fruiting, and leaf senescence, is among the most visible and oft‐recorded facets of plant ecology. Climate‐driven shifts in plant phenology can alter reproductive success, interspecific competition, and trophic interactions. Low‐cost phenology research, including observational records and experimental manipulations, is fundamental to our understanding of both the mechanisms and effects of phenological change in plant populations, species, and communities. Traditions of local‐scale botanical phenology observations and data leveraged from written records and natural history collections provide the historical context for recent observations of changing phenologies. New technology facilitates expanding the spatial, taxonomic, and human interest in this research by combining contemporary field observations by researchers and open access community science (e.g., USA National Phenology Network) and available climate data. Established experimental techniques, such as twig cutting and common garden experiments, are low‐cost methods for studying the mechanisms and drivers of plant phenology, enabling researchers to observe phenological responses under novel environmental conditions. We discuss the strengths, limitations, potential hidden costs (i.e., volunteer and student labor), and promise of each of these methods for addressing emerging questions in plant phenology research. Applied thoughtfully, economically, and creatively, many low‐cost approaches offer novel opportunities to fill gaps in our geographic, taxonomic, and mechanistic understanding of plant phenology worldwide. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-7186900 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2020 |
publisher | John Wiley and Sons Inc. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-71869002020-04-29 Low‐cost observations and experiments return a high value in plant phenology research McDonough MacKenzie, Caitlin Gallinat, Amanda S. Zipf, Lucy Appl Plant Sci Review Article Plant ecologists in the Anthropocene are tasked with documenting, interpreting, and predicting how plants respond to environmental change. Phenology, the timing of seasonal biological events including leaf‐out, flowering, fruiting, and leaf senescence, is among the most visible and oft‐recorded facets of plant ecology. Climate‐driven shifts in plant phenology can alter reproductive success, interspecific competition, and trophic interactions. Low‐cost phenology research, including observational records and experimental manipulations, is fundamental to our understanding of both the mechanisms and effects of phenological change in plant populations, species, and communities. Traditions of local‐scale botanical phenology observations and data leveraged from written records and natural history collections provide the historical context for recent observations of changing phenologies. New technology facilitates expanding the spatial, taxonomic, and human interest in this research by combining contemporary field observations by researchers and open access community science (e.g., USA National Phenology Network) and available climate data. Established experimental techniques, such as twig cutting and common garden experiments, are low‐cost methods for studying the mechanisms and drivers of plant phenology, enabling researchers to observe phenological responses under novel environmental conditions. We discuss the strengths, limitations, potential hidden costs (i.e., volunteer and student labor), and promise of each of these methods for addressing emerging questions in plant phenology research. Applied thoughtfully, economically, and creatively, many low‐cost approaches offer novel opportunities to fill gaps in our geographic, taxonomic, and mechanistic understanding of plant phenology worldwide. John Wiley and Sons Inc. 2020-04-25 /pmc/articles/PMC7186900/ /pubmed/32351799 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/aps3.11338 Text en © 2020 McDonough MacKenzie et al. Applications in Plant Sciences is published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of the Botanical Society of America This is an open access article under the terms of the http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
spellingShingle | Review Article McDonough MacKenzie, Caitlin Gallinat, Amanda S. Zipf, Lucy Low‐cost observations and experiments return a high value in plant phenology research |
title | Low‐cost observations and experiments return a high value in plant phenology research |
title_full | Low‐cost observations and experiments return a high value in plant phenology research |
title_fullStr | Low‐cost observations and experiments return a high value in plant phenology research |
title_full_unstemmed | Low‐cost observations and experiments return a high value in plant phenology research |
title_short | Low‐cost observations and experiments return a high value in plant phenology research |
title_sort | low‐cost observations and experiments return a high value in plant phenology research |
topic | Review Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7186900/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32351799 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/aps3.11338 |
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