A recently published study lead by Sophia Etzold (ICOS-CH scientist at WSL) shows that only a small part of the vegetation period is used for annual growth, hence trees only grow on a few days per year. Daily growth data measured by dendrometers within the TreeNet network were used. Read more in the WSL News!
Etzold S, Sterck F, Bose AK, Braun S, Buchmann N, Eugster W, Gessler A, Kahmen A, Peters RL, Vitasse Y, Walthert L, Ziemińska K, Zweifel R (2021) Number of growth days and not length of the growth period determines radial stem growth of temperate trees. Ecology Letters. doi: 10.1111/ele.13933
(Picture: R. Zweifel)