Treesearch

The PREDICTS project—Projecting Responses of Ecological Diversity In Changing Terrestrial Systems (www.predicts.org.uk)—has collated from published studies a large, reasonably representative database of comparable samples of biodiversity from multiple sites that differ in the nature or intensity of human impacts relating to land use. We have used this evidence base to develop global and regional statistical models of how local biodiversity responds to these measures. We describe and make freely available this 2016 release of the database, containing more than 3.2 million records sampled at...

A module to simulate glacier runoff, PRMSglacier, was added to PRMS (Precipitation Runoff Modeling System), a distributed-parameter, physical-process hydrological simulation code. The extension does not require extensive on-glacier measurements or computational expense but still relies on physical principles over empirical relations as much as is feasible while maintaining model usability. PRMSglacier is validated on two basins in Alaska, Wolverine, and Gulkana Glacier basin, which have been studied since 1966 and have a substantial amount of data with which to test model performance over...

Accurate detection and quantification of vegetation dynamics and drivers of observed climatic and anthropogenic change in space and time is fundamental for our understanding of the atmosphere–biosphere interactions at local and global scales. This case study examined the coupled spatial patterns of vegetation dynamics and climatic variabilities during the past three decades in the Upper Heihe River Basin (UHRB), a complex multiple use watershed in arid northwestern China. We apply empirical orthogonal function (EOF) and singular value decomposition (SVD) analysis to isolate and identify...

We examined the effects of repeated growing season prescribed fire on the structure and composition of mixed pine–hardwood forests in the southeastern Piedmont region, Georgia, USA. Plots were burned two to four times over an eight-year period with low intensity surface fires during one of four six-week long periods from early April to mid-September. Density of saplings (0.25–11.6 cm diameter at breast height) was significantly reduced after one or two fires during the first four-year period. Sapling density declined with additional burning over the next four years, but density of mesic...

In 1998 we measured a large, old aspen in a mixed spruce-fir-aspen forest on the Utah State University T.W. Daniel Experimental Forest in northern Utah. The tree was 297 years old - about the same age as the oldest spruce in the stand. A search of the forestry literature revealed that the oldest published age for an aspen came from a tree in the Sierra Nevada Range in California, and that tree would have been had been 266 years old, if it was still alive at the time the Daniel Forest aspen was cored. Subsequently, a graduate student in Colorado described aspen in the 275-year range, and...

Root diseases are known to suppress forest regeneration and reduce growth rates, and they may become more common as susceptible tree species become maladapted in parts of their historic ranges due to climate change. However, current ecosystem models do not track the effects of root disease on net productivity, and there has been little research on how the dynamics of root disease affect carbon (C) storage and productivity across infected landscapes. We compared the effects of root disease against the effects of other types of forest disturbance across six national forest landscapes,...

There is a need to implement methods for rapid burned area detection using a suitable replacement for Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) imagery to meet future mapping and monitoring needs (Roy and Boschetti 2009, Tucker and Yager 2011). The Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) sensor onboard the Suomi-National Polar-orbiting Partnership satellite (S-NPP) presents an alternative raw data source (www.nsof.class.noaa.gov) with resolutions comparable to that of MODIS (Boken and others 2010, Murphy and others 2001, Tucker and Yager 2011), and it has already...

Fuel loading estimates from planar intersect sampling protocols for fine dead down woody surface fuels require an approximation of the mean squared diameter (d2) of 1-h (0-0.63 cm), 10-h (0.63-2.54 cm), and 100-h (2.54-7.62 cm) timelag size classes. The objective of this study is to determine d2 in ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa) forests of New Mexico and Colorado, USA in natural, partially harvested, and partially harvested and burned sites to improve fine woody fuel loading estimates. Resulting estimates were generally higher in the 1- and 10-h classes and lower in the 100-h classes...

This study was conducted to support fire and forest management planning in eucalypt plantations based on economic, ecological and fire prevention criteria, with a focus on strategic prioritisation of fuel treatments over time. The central objective was to strategically locate fuel treatments to minimise losses from wildfire while meeting budget constraints and demands for wood supply for the pulp industry and conserving carbon.