Some Plants Can Adapt to Climate Change

A new study conducted by scientists from Syracuse University and the University of Sheffield found that some plant species are adaptable to long-term changes in temperature and rainfall. The new findings resulted from the analysis of 13 years of data collected at the Buxton Climate Change Impacts Laboratory (BCCIL) in the United Kingdom by Emeritus Professor J. Philip Grime and colleagues at the University of Sheffield. BCCIL is a field laboratory of grasslands consisting largely of slow-growing herbs and sub-shrubs. Thirty small grassland plots were subjected to microclimate manipulation. A similar experiment was concurrently conducted on grasslands in Southern England. In a 2000 study by Grime and colleagues, the vegetation in the southern plots was substantially altered by the climate changes, while the Buxton vegetation in the north was virtually unaffected.

"Contemporary wisdom suggests that climate changes cause plants to move or die," says Jason Fridley, study co-author and assistant professor of biology in The College of Arts and Sciences at SU. "However, our study suggests that if the changes in climate occur slowly enough, some plants have the ability to respond, adapt and thrive in their existing location."

Read the press release at http://sunews.syr.edu/story_details.cfm?id=5149.