Abstract Soil microbes aid in the drought tolerance of plants, yet the extent to which a microbial community’s previous drought exposure can affect plant responses to contemporary drought is largely unknown. To address this gap using a greenhouse experiment, we planted saplings of three eastern hardwoods ( Prunus virginiana , Liriodendron tulipifera , and Quercus rubra ) in field soils exposed to experimentally-induced drought or ambient moisture. Then, we altered the watering regime of the pots to induce contemporary drought (or no water stress) and measured several physiological responses. In pots containing soils with no drought history, contemporary drought reduced C assimilation rates, stomatal conductance, and leaf water potential in all tree species, as expected. However, in pots containing soils with a drought history, one species – P. virginiana – was buffered from the effects of contemporary drought, displaying no drought-induced changes in physiology. The buffering effect of the soil drought history treatment also affected soluble sugars, which increased to a lesser degree (in response to contemporary drought) than in soils with no drought history. These effects were not apparent in the other two species. Sterilized soils suggest that the soil drought history effect on some physiological variables in P. virginiana likely resulted from drought-induced responses of soil microbes as opposed to soil physical or chemical changes. Collectively, our results indicate that in addition to plant hydraulic traits, the physiological responses of some tree species to drought may depend, in part, on plant-soil-microbe interactions shaped by past stress exposures.
Spanier et al. (2026) studied this question.