Seed source variation affects the growth, biomass, carbon stock, and climate resilience potential: A case study of Celtis australis in Indian Himalayas

Climate change has adversely affected the tree species growth throughout the globe. In Indian Himalayas, Celtis australis is an important agroforestry tree species which is highly exploited for domestic use (fuel wood, fodder, and small timber), and thus the growth and biomass production linked to the species bears importance. However, growth, biomass, and carbon stock of C. australis can be improved if genetically superior planting material is used under agroforestry programmes. Therefore, seed source (SS) variation studies in C. australis were initiated to identify potential germplasm for improving the species pro-ductivity and climate resilience. Experimental results showed that genotypic variation for height, collar diameter, and total biomass were found higher than corresponding envi-ronmental variance after four years. In the field environment, highest plant growth was recorded in Tehri SS (Height: 4.88 m; Diameter: 9.69 cm) and Solan SS (Height: 4.81 m; Diameter: 8.64 cm), compared to rest of the seed sources. In contrast, least plant growth (Height: 3.46 m; Diameter 5.19 cm) was observed in Dehradun SS. Likewise, biomass production was assessed maximum (207 t ha(-1)) in Tehri SS and it was minimum (44 t ha(-1)) in Dehradun SS. In different seed sources, the estimated carbon stock and carbon sequestration was ranged between 33 103 t ha(-1) and 99-381 t ha(-1), respectively. Overall, growth, biomass, carbon stock, and carbon sequestration confirmed the superi-ority of Tehri SS over rest of the SS, after four years of field experiment. Moreover, Tehri SS showed better mitigation and adaptation potential for changing climate compared to rest of the SS, because of its superiority in term of the growth performance, biomass pro-duction, carbon stock, and carbon sequestration. The results indicated that SS induced genetic variation has the tremendous potential to improve the productivity and climate change mitigation and adaptation in C. australis. Therefore, selection of genetically diverse seed sources and evaluation of their potential (adaptive and mitigate) could be one of the futuristic strategies for climate change related fine-tuning of agroforestry practices. (C) 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Automated summary

The study in Indian Himalayas showed that Celtis australis growth and biomass production can be improved by using genetically superior planting material, with Tehri seed source performing the best in terms of plant growth, biomass production, carbon stock, and carbon sequestration.