Decreasing stem growth in common European tree species despite earlier growth onset

Recent findings suggest that global warming is altering the timing of trees’ phenological activities including earlier emergence from winter dormancy. While early-season warming can boost carbon uptake, tree growth does not seem to benefit. The underlying mechanisms and the altered intra- and inter-annual growth dynamics, as well as their interaction with environmental factors, remain poorly understood. We analysed daily-resolved dendrometer data from 228 trees across 48 Swiss forest sites over 2012–2022 to examine stem radial growth timing, intra- and inter-annual dynamics, and environmental controls for five tree species. We examined how weekly tree growth is related to envrionmental variables including day length, temperature, preciipitation, vapor pressure deficit, soil water potential and their interactions. We found a significant negative growth trend for Picea abies, Abies alba, and Fagus sylvatica across a wide climatic gradient. The reduction in growth was associ..., The data is a part of an extensive tree growth and drought monitoring network (www.treenet.info) in Switzerland. In this network, radial stem growth is derived from measurements of stem radius changes of trees with high-precision point dendrometers on mainly mature dominant trees. Tree radial growth was measured at about 1.3 m above the ground. The data was recorded and transmitted with Decentlab data transfer nodes (Decentlab GmbH, Duebendorf, Switzerland) with a logging resolution <1 µm at every 5-10 mins. The measurements were processed to a 10-min time aligned data set using the R-package ‘treenetproc’, including outlier removal, jump correction and linear interpolation of short gaps. Radial growth data, extracted with the zero-growth assumption were aggregated on a daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly sum basis. As growth strongly varies within individual trees, across years, species, sites and climatic regions, annual growth was standardized by converting it to relative annual gr..., # Decreasing stem growth in common European tree species despite earlier growth onset

#### GENERAL INFORMATION

Daily-resolved dendrometer-based tree radial growth, characteristics of site and climate where trees are growing for seven tree species in Switzerland from Bose et al (2025). Decreasing stem growth in common European tree species despite earlier growth onset. Global Change Biology DOI:10.1111/gcb.70318

Author Information

A. Principal Investigator

Name: Arun K. Bose
Contact Information: Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research, Zürcherstrasse 111, CH-8903 Birmensdorf, Switzerland.
Email: [[e-mail]](mailto:[e-mail])

B. Co-investigator information:

Names: Sophia Etzold, Katrin Meusburger, Arthur Gessler, Andri Baltensweiler, Sabine Braun, Nina Buchmann, J. Julio Camarero, Matthias Haeni, Ansgar Kahmen, Richard L. Peters, Frank J. Sterck, Simon Tresch, Lorenz Walthert, and Roman Zweifel

Date of data collection: From 2012 to 2022

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