The importance of fog for the survival and growth of tropical cloud
forests is receiving increasing interest in the context of climate
change. Current knowledge on this topic is almost entirely based on
studies at the species level, which can hardly reflect the response of
the whole ecosystem to climate change. We evaluated community-level
responses of trees and epiphytes to seasonal drought in Hainan tropical
cloud forest ecosystem. We found that fog induced suppressed
photosynthetic water demand and foliar water uptake help these forests
escape from drought. We infer that reduction in fog due to future
climate change may result in high plant mortality in these ecosystems,
and artificially simulating fog may help save tropical cloud forests
from vanishing worldwide.