Document Type

Article

Publication Date

12-5-2019

Publication Title

Ecosphere

Publisher

Ecological Society of America

Volume

10

Issue

12

First page number:

1

Last page number:

18

Abstract

Climate change is predicted to impact ecosystems through altered precipitation (PPT) regimes. In the Chihuahuan Desert, multiyear wet and dry periods and extreme PPT pulses are the most influential climatic events for vegetation. Vegetation responses are most frequently studied locally, and regional responses are often unclear. We present an approach to quantify correlation of PPT and vegetation responses (as Normalized Difference Vegetation Index [NDVI]) at the Jornada ARS‐LTER site (JRN; 550 km2 area) and the surrounding dryland region (from 0 to 500 km distance; 400,000 km2 study area) as a way to understand regional similarity to locally observed patterns. We focused on fluctuating wet and dry years, multiyear wet or dry periods of 3–4 yr, and multiyear wet periods that contained one or more extreme high PPT pulses or extreme low rainfall. In all but extreme high PPT years, JRN PPT was highly correlated... (See article for full abstract).

Disciplines

Desert Ecology

File Format

pdf

File Size

4.019 KB

Language

English

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

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