Treesearch

Variation in nutritional quality of natural forages for black-tailed deer (Odocoileus hemionus) was studied in summer and winter in southeast Alaska. Freeze-dried samples of 17 summer forages collected in early July and 10 winter forages collected in February from three replicate sites each of shady forest understory and open, sunny habitat were analyzed and compared for their concentrations of digestible protein, digestible dry matter, and digestible energy. Data from each forage, ranging from forb and shrub leaves to woody twigs, were analyzed separately in a single-factor analysis of...

: We conducted a meta-analysis on 64 econometric models from 47 studies predicting forestland conversion to agriculture (F2A), forestland to development (F2D), forestland to non-forested (F2NF) and undeveloped (including forestland) to developed (U2D) land. Over 250 independent econometric variables were identified from 21 F2A models, 21 F2D models, 12 F2NF models, and 10 U2D models. These variables were organized into a hierarchy of 119 independent variable groups, 15 categories, and 4 econometric drivers suitable for conducting simple vote count statistics. Vote counts were summarized at...

Studies of forests and urban forest ecosystems have documented the various biophysical and socioeconomic correlates of carbon storage. Tree cover in particular is often used as a determinant of carbon storage for local and national level urban forest assessments. However, the relationships among variables describing the biophysical and socioeconomic environment and carbon are not simple statistical ones. Instead, there are complex interactions that can have either a unidirectional causal effects, or produce indirect effects through interactions with other ecosystem structure and landscape...

There is an increasing interest in estimating biomass for loblolly pine (Pinus taeda L.) and slash pine (Pinus elliottii Engelm. var. elliottii), two of the most ecologically and commercially important tree species in North America. The majority of the available individual-tree allometric models are local, relying on stem diameter outside bark at breast height (dbh) and, in some cases, total tree height (H): only a few include stand age or other covariates. Using a large dataset collected from five forestry research institutions in the southeastern U.S., consisting of biomass measurements...

The northern conifer, or spruce-fir, forest of the northeastern USA and adjacent Canada has had a defining influence on the economy and culture of the region. The same can be said of the USDA Forest Service’s research in this forest, which began more than 100 years ago. Forest Service research has evolved since that time in response to changes in the needs and prominence of the forest industry, and in public attitudes and concerns. Early studies of forest protection and rehabilitation first gave way to mid-century research on production forestry, then to twenty-first-century research on...

Understanding the responses of terrestrial ecosystems to global change remains a major challenge of ecological research. We exploited a natural elevation gradient in a northern hardwood forest to determine how reductions in snow accumulation, expected with climate change, directly affect dynamics of soil winter frost, and indirectly soil microbial biomass and activity during the growing season. Soils from lower elevation plots, which accumulated less snow and experienced more soil temperature variability during the winter (and likely more freeze/thaw events), had less extractable inorganic...

The contribution of understorey vegetation (UVEG) to forest ecosystem biomass and carbon (C) across diverse forest types has, to date, eluded quantification at regional and national scales. Efforts to quantify UVEG C have been limited to field-intensive studies or broad-scalemodelling approaches lacking fieldmeasurements. Although large-scale inventories of UVEG C are not common, species- and community-level inventories of vegetation structure are available and may prove useful in quantifying UVEG C stocks. This analysis developed a general framework for estimating UVEG C stocks by...

Black cherry is one of the most valuable hardwood species for cabinetry, furniture, and veneer. The goal of this study was to develop transgenic black cherry plants with reproductive sterility and enhanced insect resistance. Black cherry TERMINAL FLOWER 1 (PsTFL1) was overexpressed under the control of the CaMV 35S promoter in black cherry via Agrobacterium-mediated transformation, as a strategy for gene containment. PsTFL1 is a homolog of Arabidopsis TFL1 which is known to play a key role in regulating flowering time by counteracting with FLOWERING LOCUS T and repressing the transcription...

This publication provides an overview of the forest resources in West Virginia based upon inventories conducted by the U.S. Forest Service, Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) program of the Northern Research Station. Information about the FIA program is available online at http://fia.fs.fed.us. Since 2004, FIA has implemented an annual inventory in West Virginia. For the 2013 inventory, estimates for current variables, such as forest area, volume, and biomass, are based on 2,370 plots (both forested and nonforest) inventoried from 2009-2013. Change variables, such as net growth, removals,...

Forestry practitioners contacted us with their concerns about a recent review article by Buchholz T, Friedland AJ, Hornig CE, Keeton WS, Zanchi G, Nunery J (2013) GCB Bioenergy who questioned the way soil carbon is treated in many models and protocols, and indicated that an increasing number of research studies showed meaningful soil organic carbon (SOC) loss as a result of forest management. We revisit the major studies cited in the review and present a more complete look at the results, consistently treat forest floor carbon as a separate pool, discuss differences in interpretation, and...