Journal
AGRICULTURAL AND FOREST METEOROLOGY
Volume 213, Issue -, Pages 291-303Publisher
ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV
DOI: 10.1016/j.agrformet.2014.11.014
Keywords
Eddy covariance; Estuarine forest; Penman-Monteith; Sap flux; Water cycle
Categories
Funding
- USGS Priority Ecosystems Program
- NPS Critical Ecosystems Initiative (CESI)
- USGS Climate and Land Use Change RD Program
- USGS Ecosystems Mission Area
- National Science Foundation [WSC-0920504]
- Division Of Earth Sciences
- Directorate For Geosciences [1204666] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
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Leaves from mangrove forests are often considered efficient in the use of water during photosynthesis, but less is known about whole-tree and stand-level water use strategies. Are mangrove forests as conservative in water use as experimental studies on seedlings imply? Here, we apply a simple model to estimate stand water use (S), determine the contribution of S to evapotranspiration (ET), and approximate the distribution of S versus ET over annual cycles for three mangrove forests in southwest Florida, USA. The value of S ranged from 350 to 511 mm year(-1) for two mangrove forests in Rookery Bay to 872 mm year(-1) for a mangrove forest along the Shark River in Everglades National Park. This represents 34-49% of ET for Rookery Bay mangroves, a rather conservative rate of S, and 63-66% of ET for the Shark River mangroves, a less conservative rate of S. However, variability in estimates of S in mangroves is high enough to require additional study on the spatial changes related to forest structural shifts, different tidal regimes, and variable site-specific salinity concentrations in multiple mangrove forests before a true account of water use conservation strategies can be understood at the landscape scale. Evidence does suggest that large, well-developed mangrove forests have the potential to contribute considerably to the ET balance; however, regionally most mangrove forests are much smaller in stature in Florida and likely contribute less to regional water losses through stand-level transpiration. Published by Elsevier B.V.
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