Climate change has adverse effects on living organisms, be it animals or plants. Some major impacts of Climate change are increased flooding, droughts, rising carbon dioxide concentrations, global warming, and increase in temperatures, or heat waves. This affects plants in many ways from their growth to reproduction.
Scientists find it hard to predict the effects of global warming and climate change. However, climate change have been proven to be devastating for humankind.
Reasons for climate change:
Climate changes are brought about by various natural and human activities including burning fossil fuels, deforestation, farming, automobiles, and industrialization. These activities release greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere. These greenhouse gasses trap heat radiation. This phenomenon is termed as the greenhouse effect which is the major cause of global warming. Another reason for global temperature change is pollutants in the air. Greenhouse gasses and air pollutants both are often called climate forcers.
Major causes of climate change can be summed up as;
- Deforestation
- Global warming
- Emission of pollutants
- Greenhouse gasses
- Burning of fossil fuels
- Urbanization
Plants Respond to Climate Change:
Climate changes are getting adverse with the passage of time. Climate change refers to one of the major regulators of plant growth and physiological processes, temperature. Plants being sessile and having longer life spans compared to humans, are more prone to even the slightest temperature change. Hence, plants need to make physiological changes to cope with changing temperatures. These changes are termed as the plant’s response to changing climate. Most plants have the ability to make physiological adjustments in them to deal with climate changes. In case a plant fails to adjust to this abrupt change in temperature, it may move its habitat or may even go extinct
Carbon fertilization effect: Excess of CO2 in the atmosphere also results in an increased rate of photosynthesis. This is the carbon fertilization effect which, according to researchers, has caused an increase of 12% in global plant photosynthesis with an increase of 17% in CO2 in their environment from the year 1982-2020. This large increase in photosynthesis has led to more growth in plants. Plants usually show response to climate change by absorbing more CO2 from the environment which results in increased photosynthesis and increased growth rate. Elevated levels of CO2 may benefit crop yields up to 14% including major agricultural food crops like wheat and rice.
Since 1880 average temperature has risen by 1°C (Ciais et al., 2013). This will continue to rise due to carbon emissions with increasing levels of CO2. Rising temperatures affect the species functioning and their geographical habitats.
Plants tend to adjust to their environment so as to either maintain or increase carbon gain. Moreover, these adjustments may include the reduction of respiration activity (Atkin and Tjoelker, 2003). Some plants respond to climate change by an increased total leaf area (Way and Oren, 2010) while others may increase the rate of assimilation to cope with high-temperature climate.
Increased carbon dioxide also reduces the stomatal index of plants. In plant species like soybean, rice, wheat beans, and peanut, a visible increase in shoot biomass has been observed with carbon gain. The root biomass of many crop species has increased significantly in response to elevated concentrations of CO2.
Plants in Cooler Regions:
- Acclimation capacities vary with varying species but they are also affected by the climate of their habitats. According to researchers, Plants adapted to cooler regions show increased photosynthesis rates hence positive growth in warmer temperatures.
- It is an indication of the fact that plants adapted to warmer regions have a poor ability to adjust to warmer temperatures.
- Plants at higher-latitude face temperature fluctuations.
Plants in Warmer Regions:
- On the other hand, Plants in warmer regions show lowered growth rates, and reduced photosynthesis when grown in warmer low-latitude climates.
- The reason for this is that plants at lower latitudes are adapted to a stable environment working at optimal temperatures.
- Increased temperature in this area would result in reduced carbon uptake.
Climate changes bring natural disasters like flooding. Plants also play the role of a buffer against extreme climate changes. They slow down the water flow rate and store flood water so that pollutants can be deposited in wetlands. This reduces soil erosion and reduces flooding. They also absorb more carbon dioxide by opening their stomata. These changes help plants deal with climate changes and survive under uncertain circumstances.
Final words:
Plants have a major impact on the environment. Collective responses of plants to climate change may impact future global warming and climate change. Tropical rainforest plants don’t show enough capacity to cope with climate change which makes them vulnerable to adverse climate changes. Photosynthesis is largely dependent on the temperature
Understanding plants’ responses to climate changes helps scientists predict the responses of plants to possible climate changes in the future.
