Nutrients may be mobilized from senescing leaves and transported to other plant tissues, enabling plants to conserve them and reuse. Nitrogen and phosphorus are two dominant nutrients related to photosynthetic capacity and limiting plant growth. In this study, we examined the effect of canopy height on nutrient use by analyzing N and P concentrations of green and senescent leaves collected from different canopy heights of Abies georgei var. smithii (Viguie et Gaussen) Cheng growing at the alpine timberline in Sergyemla Mt. (4 350 m a.s.l), southeastern Tibetan Plateau. The results showed that N and P concentrations per unit needle mass decreased significantly with needle age, but no significant difference was found among upper, middle and lower canopy. However, area-based N and P concentrations increased with the height of canopy. The leaf level nutrient resorption and use efficiency varied in the order: upper canopy> middle canopy >lower canopy for both N and P. The higher nutrient resorption efficiency had significant relationship with leaf level nutrient use efficiency, that is, higher leaf level nutrient use efficiency was partly due to the high resorption from senescent needles. Additionally, the higher nutrient resorption was related to high current nutrient concentration. Vertical variations of leaf level nutrient use efficiency in this study reflected the strategy of alpine trees to respond to imbalance between light availability and soil nutrients.
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