Weather drivers of reproductive variability in perennial plants and their implications for climate change risks

Abstract

Seed production in perennial plants often shows strong year-to-year variation, a phenomenon known as masting. Masting is typically adaptive and driven by weather cues that synchronize reproduction by promoting or suppressing flowering and seed set. These cues, involving temperature, precipitation, and drought, differ across species and regions, yet a global synthesis is needed. Understanding such patterns is crucial, as reproductive responses to climate interact with resource constraints to shape plant fitness under climate change. Here, we analyze climate-reproduction relationships in 746 populations of 331 species worldwide using moving-window methods. We find that temperature is the dominant cue for reproductive investment, though its influence is weaker in the wettest and driest climates. In temperate and boreal regions, reproduction is most often linked to warmer conditions, whereas in the tropics, reproduction is disproportionately linked to cooler temperatures. Therefore, we expect rising temperatures to increase reproductive failures in the tropics, but to reduce interannual variability in temperate and boreal zones as favorable cues become more frequent. These results confirm long-standing theoretical predictions and provide a global framework for evaluating climate change risks to mast seeding.