Jon Cranko Page

Jon Cranko Page

Postdoc exploring the predictability of terrestrial ecosystem fluxes

Publications

Are Plant Functional Types Fit for Purpose?

Published in Geophysical Research Letters, 2023

To predict how changes in future climate and weather extremes might impact terrestrial ecosystems, we need to understand the timescales of vegetation response to antecedent climate. Prevailing methods of exploration assume such responses to be stationary, that is constant through time. We present a novel approach that shows how the memory of plants to climate conditions change through time. We show that the carbon and water fluxes of vegetation can be significantly sensitive to antecedent rainfall and importantly that this sensitivity can vary substantially through time. Plant functional type is a key indicator of the role of memory to precipitation, while the response to antecedent rainfall is not determined by site aridity. Predicting future changes in the global carbon sink requires understanding how vegetation responds to climate across timescales. Identifying these timescales at which plants respond to climate is critically important as the climate changes, especially if extremes (e.g., heatwaves) become more frequent due to compounding effects.

Recommended citation: Cranko Page, J., Abramowitz, G., De Kauwe, M. G., & Pitman, A. J. (2024). Are plant functional types fit for purpose? Geophysical Research Letters, 51, e2023GL104962. https://doi.org/10.1029/2023GL104962 https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2023GL104962

Non-Stationary Lags and Legacies in Ecosystem Flux Response to Antecedent Rainfall

Published in JGR: Biogeosciences, 2023

To predict how changes in future climate and weather extremes might impact terrestrial ecosystems, we need to understand the timescales of vegetation response to antecedent climate. Prevailing methods of exploration assume such responses to be stationary, that is constant through time. We present a novel approach that shows how the memory of plants to climate conditions change through time. We show that the carbon and water fluxes of vegetation can be significantly sensitive to antecedent rainfall and importantly that this sensitivity can vary substantially through time. Plant functional type is a key indicator of the role of memory to precipitation, while the response to antecedent rainfall is not determined by site aridity. Predicting future changes in the global carbon sink requires understanding how vegetation responds to climate across timescales. Identifying these timescales at which plants respond to climate is critically important as the climate changes, especially if extremes (e.g., heatwaves) become more frequent due to compounding effects.

Recommended citation: Cranko Page, J., De Kauwe, M. G., Abramowitz, G., & Pitman, A. J. (2023). Non-stationary lags and legacies in ecosystem flux response to antecedent rainfall. Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences, 128, e2022JG007144. https://doi.org/10.1029/2022JG007144 https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2022JG007144

Examining the role of environmental memory in the predictability of carbon and water fluxes across Australian ecosystems

Published in Biogeosciences, 2022

Although vegetation responds to climate at a wide range of timescales, models of the land carbon sink often ignore responses that do not occur instantly. In this study, we explore the timescales at which Australian ecosystems respond to climate. We identified that carbon and water fluxes can be modelled more accurately if we include environmental drivers from up to a year in the past. The importance of antecedent conditions is related to ecosystem aridity but is also influenced by other factors.

Recommended citation: Cranko Page, J., De Kauwe, M. G., Abramowitz, G., Cleverly, J., Hinko-Najera, N., Hovenden, M. J., Liu, Y., Pitman, A. J., and Ogle, K.: Examining the role of environmental memory in the predictability of carbon and water fluxes across Australian ecosystems, Biogeosciences, 19, 1913–1932, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-1913-2022, 2022. https://bg.copernicus.org/articles/19/1913/2022/