Water Relations of Plants in Raised Sphagnum Peat Bogs

Abstract

The water relations of woody plants of a raised sphagnum peat bog were examined by evaluation of water potential employing the pressure bomb and by measuring transpiration resistance with a leaf—resistance porometer. The plants studied proved to be similar to those of a number of mesophytes growing adjacent to the bog and exhibited no evidence of drought stress. The concept of physiological drought is an inadequate explanation of the extremely xeromorphic characteristics of bog vegetation, which are more plausibly accounted for by other factors.