Comparison of growth response of Abies and Picea species to climate in Mt. Norikura, central Japan

Tree-ring chronologies were developed from Abies mariesii Masters and Picea jezoensis ssp. hondoensis (Mayr) P. Schmidt collected at different altitudes of Mt. Norikura, central Japan. The tree-ring parameters of ring width and maximum density were measured by soft X-ray densitometry. The measurement series were detrended by fitting a 33-year cubic smoothing spline and autoregressive model. The correlation between species and between sites showed different responses of the species to climate in terms of ring width and maximum density. The correlation coefficient between sites within a species was higher than that between species for a site in the ring width, and the coefficient between species for a site was higher in maximum density. The correlation coefficient between tree-ring chronology and monthly climate data set showed different responses of radial growth to climate. The different response was probably explained by the difference in the length of the growing season. High summer temperature increased the maximum density of the two species and the radial growth in Abies mariesii. Summer precipitation correlated negatively to maximum density, but it did not affect the ring width of either species. The climatic signals could be extracted from ring-width and maximum-density chronologies of both species.