Revisiting climate change effects on winter chill in mountain oases of northern Oman
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Revisiting climate change effects on winter chill in mountain oases of northern Oman Andreas Buerkert 1
2
1
& Eduardo Fernandez & Beke Tietjen & Eike Luedeling
2
Received: 7 April 2020 / Accepted: 30 August 2020/ # The Author(s) 2020
Abstract
For centuries, traditional high-altitude oases in Oman have depended on the cultivation of deciduous fruit trees. This study explores the effects of climate change on winter chill (estimated as Chilling Hours—CH and Chill Portions— CP), a prerequisite to overcoming dormancy and initiating flowering, in three Omani oases. The results are compared with findings from an earlier study which reported a decrease in the numbers of CH in high-elevation oases by an average of 1.2–9.5 CH year−1 between 1983 and 2008. Location-specific weather data were obtained by merging 15 years of in situ recordings with 28 years of observations from an official weather station near the top of the investigated watershed. Between 1991 and 2018, scenarios of the past few decades show chill reductions by 75, 35 and 18% when estimated in CP at the oases of Masayrat ar Ruwajah (1030 m a.s.l.), Qasha’ (1640 m a.s.l.), and Al ‘Ayn (1900 m a.s.l.), respectively. Over the course of the twenty-first century, the lowest-elevation oasis at Masayrat ar Ruwajah is projected to lose virtually all winter chill, whereas, despite significant chill losses, conditions are expected to remain viable for some of the currently grown species in the higher-elevation oases. These projected changes will compromise the cultivation of temperate fruit trees in the near future, affecting the sustainability of Omani oases. Our methods support results from earlier work performed at these locations and provide an updated procedure for assessing climate change effects on temperature-dependent systems. Keywords Arabia . Arid environments, . Chill requirements . Fruit production . Global warming . Warm winters
Andreas Buerkert and Eduardo Fernandez contributed equally to this work. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-02002862-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
* Andreas Buerkert buerkert@uni–kassel.de Extended author information available on the last page of the article
Climatic Change
1 Introduction Over the past decade, a range of studies has targeted the sustainability of oasis systems on the Arabian Peninsula, particularly in Oman (Al-Kalbani et al. 2016; Al-Rawahi et al. 2017; Cariou 2017; Hüneburg et al. 2019). This research was largely motivated by the demonstrated resilience of these millennia-old settlements, which makes them stand out as models of sustainable irrigated agriculture in an arid environment. The results of most studies have shown that the combination of carefully designed oasis infrastructure with well-textured human-made soils and socially organized irrigation (Siebert et al. 2007; Wilkinson 1977) is a key characteristic of Arabian oases. The integration of animal and crop husbandry has been highli
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