The spatio-temporal variations of frost-free period in China from 1951 to 2012

doi:10.1007/s11442-017-1362-z

Abstract

Abstract:

The frost-free period (FFP), first frost date (FFD) and last frost date (LFD) have been regard as the important climate variables for agricultural production. Understanding the spatio-temporal variations of the FFP, FFD and LFD is beneficial to reduce the harmful impacts of climate change on agricultural production and enhance the agricultural adaptation. This study examined daily minimum temperatures for 823 national-level meteorological stations, calculated the values of FFD, LFD and FFP for station-specific and region-specific from 1951 to 2012, estimated the gradients of linear regression for station-specific moving averages of FFD, LFD and FFP, and assessed station-specific time series of FFP and detected the abrupt change. The results as follows: at both the station level and the regional level, the FFP across China decreases with the increase of latitude from south to north, and with the increase of altitude from east to west generally. At the station level, the inter-annual fluctuations of FFD, LFD and FFP in south and west agricultural regions are greater than those in north and east. At the regional level, excluding the QT region, temporal changes of FFP are relatively small in both the low-latitude and the high-latitude regions, but for the mid-latitude regions. According to the linear trend gradients of the moving average values of station-specific FFD, LFD and FFP, FFD was delayed, LFD advanced, and FFP extended gradually over the 80% of China. Furthermore, the change magnitudes for FFD, LFD and FFP in the north and east agricultural regions are higher than that in the southern and western. Among the 659 station-specific time series of FFP examined by the Mann-Kendall test, 341 stations, located mainly in the north region, have one identifiable and significant abrupt change. And at the 341 stations with identified abrupt changes, most (57%) abrupt changes occurred during 1991-2012, followed by the periods of 1981-1990 (28%), 1971-1980 (12%), and 1951-1970 (3%). The spatio-temporal variations of FFD, LFD and FFP would provide important guidance to agricultural practices.

Key words: frost-free period, first frost date, last frost date, spatio-temporal variations, agricultural region, China

Xiaoju NING, Gangjun LIU, Lijun ZHANG, Xiaoyang QIN, Shenghui ZHOU, Yaochen QIN. The spatio-temporal variations of frost-free period in China from 1951 to 2012[J].Journal of Geographical Sciences, 2017, 27(1): 23-42.

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Region-ID (m)	Region code	μFFD_m (date)	μLFD_m (date)	μFFP_m (days)
1	QT	18 September	27 May	116
2	NE	3 October	3 May	154
3	IMGWC	1 October	2 May	152
4	GX	9 October	19 April	173
5	LP	22 October	13 April	192
6	HHH	10 November	26 March	229
7	MLRYR	Uncertain	Uncertain	295
8	SW	Uncertain	Uncertain	300
9	SC	Uncertain	Uncertain	363

	FFD				LFD				FFP
	b_t>0	0<b_t<0.25	0.25< b_t<0.5	b_t> 0.5	b_t> -0.5	-0.5<b_t<-0.25	-0.2< bt<0	b_t>0	b_t>0	0<b_t< 0.25	0.25< b_t<0.5	b_t> 0.5
b₃	13.04	78.22	7.02	1.72	0.41	33.69	56.42	9.49	0.40	11.03	75.64	12.92
b₅	13.04	79.79	5.14	2.03	0.47	29.03	57.55	12.94	0.59	16.13	62.94	19.33
b₇	11.69	70.43	14.55	3.33	0.44	30.02	54.90	14.64	0.21	18.58	59.93	19.27
b₉	13.12	71.29	12.73	2.86	0.25	26.70	57.84	15.21	0.17	19.16	60.83	17.84

Agricultural region		FFD area percentage (%)				LFD area percentage (%)				FFP area percentage (%)
ID (m)	Code	b₇>0	0<b₇< 0.25	0.25<b₇<0.5	b₇> 0.5	b₇> -0.5	-0.5<b₇<-0.25	-0.25< b₇<0	b₇>0	b₇>0	0<b₇<0.25	0.25<b₇<0.5	b₇> 0.5
1	QT	4.13	90.72	5.15	0.00	0.00	55.5	43.42	1.08	4.89	45.25	43.47	6.39
2	NE	6.32	93.33	0.35	0.00	0.00	24.26	75.74	0.00	2.38	25.15	72.01	0.46
3	IMGWC	2.11	81.73	16.10	0.06	0.00	31.65	68.35	0.00	6.06	21.13	60.28	12.53
4	GX	1.08	91.99	6.93	0.00	1.10	20.71	71.26	6.93	0.00	4.87	75.63	19.50
5	LP	3.64	67.25	28.74	0.37	3.70	27.24	69.06	0.00	0.25	8.91	44.12	46.72
6	HHH	0.70	97.08	2.22	0.00	0.00	73.38	26.62	0.00	0.21	6.18	86.10	7.51
7	MLRYR	37.63	29.01	14.88	18.48	0.00	9.24	43.55	47.21	1.04	33.01	54.96	10.99
8	SW	48.01	31.89	9.20	10.90	0.00	0.38	31.38	68.24	0.38	19.28	66.97	13.37
	China	11.69	70.43	14.55	3.33	0.44	30.02	54.90	14.64	2.21	18.58	59.93	19.28