A century of herbarium specimens and old photos from a tropical island in China reveal that climate change is pushing flowering times in opposite directions depending on the season: warming delays spring and summer blooms but makes autumn-winter flowers appear earlier.
1
Spring-flowering species delayed blooming by 5.01 ± 0.32 days per °C of warming, and summer-flowering species delayed by 1.96 ± 0.47 days per °C
2
Autumn-winter-flowering species advanced (bloomed earlier) by 5.61 ± 0.64 days per °C, the opposite direction of spring/summer species
3
Increased precipitation delayed flowering in spring (+3.54 ± 0.21 days per 10mm) and summer (+4.21 ± 0.17 days per 10mm), with no significant phylogenetic signal detected across the 56 species
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