Woody plants acid rain effect

Effect of Acid Rain on Woody Plants and Their Products... 

Acid rain has been shown to effect woody plants at all stages of their development. Seedlings, immature through older, fully expanded leaves and needles, as well as annual rings of woody plants have been shown to be injured by simulated acid rain. 

Trees can be impacted by acid rain in any number of ways and these effects can be classified as either direct or indirectClJ. The following discussion will present an overview of the many v ays acid rain could affect woody plants specifically as well as unfinished wood products. 

The research available to date presents a partial view of the impacts of acid rain on woody plants. Many of the impacts are still only potential impacts, as simulation studies versus field studies present a conflicting view. However, one thing appears quite clear - more research is needed. As many researchers have found, the effect of acid rain is not going to be one of simple cause and effect, but rather one of a multiple factor interaction. Thus, future work should be statistically designed to test the inter-action(s) rather than main effects. Work needs to be done over both the short and long term to assess injury. Basic physiological work across disciplines with the standardization of techniques used (e.g. one set type of simulator for all researchers to produce simulated acid rain) must be employed in order for different experimental results to be comparable. If we can discover how plants will react to given combinations of stresses, only then will we be able to propose an appropriate course of action. 

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