Using the dendro-climatological signal of urban trees as a measure of urbanization and urban heat island

Abstract

Using dendroclimatological techniques this study investigates whether inner city tree-ring width (TRW) chronologies from eight tree species (ash, beech, fir, larch, lime, sessile and pedunculate oak, and pine) are suitable to examine the urban heat island of Berlin, Germany. Climate-growth relationships were analyzed for 18 sites along a gradient of increasing urbanization covering Berlin and surrounding rural areas. As a proxy for defining urban heat island intensities at each site, we applied urbanization parameters such as building fraction, impervious surfaces, and green areas. The response of TRW to monthly and seasonal air temperature, precipitation, aridity, and daily air-temperature ranges were used to identify climate-growth relationships. Trees from urban sites were found to be more sensitive to climate compared to trees in the surrounding hinterland. Ring width of the deciduous species, especially ash, beech, and oak, showed a high sensitivity to summer heat and drought at urban locations (summer signal), whereas conifer species were found suitable for the analysis of the urban heat island in late winter and early spring (winter signal). The summer and winter signals were strongest in tree-ring chronologies when the urban heat island intensities were based on an area of about 200 m to 3000 m centered over the tree locations, and thus reflect the urban climate at the scale of city quarters. For the summer signal, the sensitivity of deciduous tree species to climate increased with urbanity. These results indicate that urban trees can be used for climate response analyses and open new pathways to trace the evolution of urban climate change and more specifically the urban heat island, both in time and space.