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Trends of summer precipitation and summer temperature and their influence on trends in summer drought and area burned in British Columbia (BC) were investigated for the period 1920–2000. The complexity imposed by topography was taken into account by incorporating high spatial resolution climate and fire data. Considerable regional variation in trends and in climate–fire relationships was observed. A weak but significant increase in summer temperature was detected in northeastern and coastal BC, whereas summer precipitation increased significantly in all regions—by up to 45.9 %. A significant decrease in province-wide area burned and at the level of sub-units was strongly related to increasing precipitation, more...
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An increasing number of studies conclude that water limitations and heat stress may hinder the capacity of black spruce (Picea mariana (Mill.) B.S.P.) trees, a dominant species of Canada's boreal forests, to grow and assimilate atmospheric carbon. However, there is currently no scientific consensus on the future of these forests over the next century in the context of widespread climate warming. The large spatial extent of black spruce forests across the Canadian boreal forest and associated variability in climate, demography, and site conditions pose challenges for projecting future climate change responses. Here we provide an evaluation of the impacts of climate warming and drying, as well as increasing [CO2],...
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Owing to large climatic and orographic variation, British Columbia covers a variety of ecosystems extending from temperate rainforests on the Pacific coast to boreal forests in the north-east. The aim of this study is to investigate the spatial variation of trends in wildfire activity and their relationship to summer drought for the entire province of British Columbia. Time series of annual wildfire extent and occurrence, summer self-calibrating Palmer Drought Severity Index and summer Aridity Index were derived from spatially explicit data. Sixteen landscape regions according to the provincial Biogeoclimatic Ecosystem Classification system served as spatial reference. The regional series for 1920-2000 were subjected...
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