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The impacts of climate change and forest pests and diseases are making it harder for natural resource managers to sustain important forest habitat for wildlife species and, more generally, sustain the benefits that we all derive from forest ecosystems. The natural resource management and research communities have a general understanding of what broad climate adaptation strategies may to best to navigate these mounting challenges. But what we don’t yet fully understand is how effective implementation of these broad strategies actually is, in particular forest types and in particular places. Plus, the research community needs to better understand what knowledge and tools managers need to resolve remaining uncertainties...
Categories: Publication; Types: Citation
This report provides an overview of the state of the science for climate impacts and adaptation options across the NEAFWA region and for Regional Species of Greatest Conservation Need (RSGCN) and associated habitats.
Categories: Publication; Types: Citation
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This dataset details individual species and natural habitat vulnerability rankings, including contextual study-specific information. This data was collected from original publications found through a literature search. Information is cumulative to include climate change vulnerability assessment (CCVA) results summarized in Staudinger et al. (2015) and published as of December 2023.
Abstract (from Ecosphere): Spruce–fir (Picea–Abies) forests of the North American Acadian Forest Region are at risk of disappearing from the northeastern United States and Canada due to climate change. Species distribution models (SDMs) have been used to predict changes in this critical transitional ecosystem in the past, but none have addressed how seasonal patterns of temperature and precipitation interact to influence tree species abundance. Inferences have also been limited by contemporary inventory data that could not fully characterize species ranges because they either, (1) only sampled species occurrence after large-scale human disturbance and settlement, or (2) did not span critical geopolitical boundaries...
Categories: Publication; Types: Citation
Abstract (from CanadianSciencePub): Sustaining the structure, function, and services provided by forest ecosystems in the face of changing climate and disturbance regimes represents a grand challenge for forest managers and policy makers. To address this challenge, a range of adaptation approaches have been proposed centered on conferring ecosystem resilience and adaptive capacity; however, considerable uncertainty exists regarding how to translate these broad and often theoretical adaptation frameworks to on-the-ground practice. Complicating this issue has been movement away, in some cases, from other recent advances in forest management, namely ecological silviculture strategies that often focus on restoration....
Categories: Publication; Types: Citation
Abstract (from Journal of Applied Ecology): Increasing heat and aridity in coming decades is expected to negatively impact tree growth and threaten forest sustainability in dry areas. Maintaining low stand density has the potential to mitigate the negative effects of increasingly severe droughts by minimizing competitive intensity. However, the direct impact of stand density on the growing environment (i.e. soil moisture), and the specific drought metrics that best quantify that environment, are not well explored for any forest ecosystem. We examined the relationship of varying stand density (i.e. basal area) on soil moisture and stand‐level growth in a long‐term (multi‐decadal), ponderosa pine Pinus ponderosa,...
Categories: Publication; Types: Citation
Abstract (from Conservation Science and Practice): On a warming planet, a key challenge natural resource managers face is protecting wildlife while mitigating climate change—as through forest carbon storage—to the greatest extent possible. But in some ecosystems, habitat restoration for imperiled species may be incompatible with maximizing carbon storage. For example, promoting early successional forest conditions does not maximize stand-level carbon storage, whereas uniformly promoting high stocking or mature forest conditions in the name of carbon storage excludes species that require open or young stands. Here, we briefly review the literature regarding carbon and wildlife trade-offs and then explore four case...
Categories: Publication; Types: Citation
Deadwood moisture plays a major role in regulating deadwood decomposition rates and may also affect forest microclimate. Despite this, the temporal variability of deadwood moisture at 15-min time scales remains relatively unknown because techniques for using high-frequency sensors for tracking moisture at appropriate spatial and temporal intensities have been lacking. We installed a high-density sensor array in and around a downed log to gain a detailed assessment regarding the temporal variation of volumetric water content at multiple locations within one downed dead log, the source snag, and the surrounding soil. We also measured micrometeorological variables near the log in order to predict variability of the...
Categories: Publication; Types: Citation
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Controlling the spread and impacts of invasive species is becoming more challenging as climate conditions change. More relevant information is needed to guide timely and localized management actions for these species to preserve cultural resources and ecosystem integrity. Data products are most valuable when they are developed with input from the people who use them for invasive species management decisions. This project will invite decision makers, Tribal representatives, and natural resource managers to share the social and cultural values that influence their trust and use of data. These shared insights will be used by the project team to shape the format, delivery, and communication of a suite of map products...
Abstract (frrom Canadian Journal of Forest Research): Epigeous fungal fruiting has important impacts on fungal reproduction and ecosystem function. Forest disturbances, such as timber harvest, impact moisture, host availability, and substrate availability, which in turn may drive changes in fungal fruiting patterns and community structure. We surveyed mushrooms in 0.4 ha patch cuts (18 months post-harvest) and adjacent intact hardwood forest in northern New Hampshire, USA, to document the effects of timber harvest on summer fruiting richness, biomass, diversity, and community structure of ectomycorrhizal, parasitic, and saprobic mushroom taxa. Fungal fruiting richness, diversity, and community heterogeneity were...
Categories: Publication; Types: Citation
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The forests of the Northeastern United States are home to some of the greatest diversity of nesting songbirds in the country. Climate change, shifts in natural disturbance regimes, and invasive species pose threats to forest habitats and bird species in the northeastern United States and represent major challenges to natural resource managers. Although broad adaptation approaches have been suggested for sustaining forested habitats under global change, it is unclear how effective the implementation of these strategies at local and regional scales will be for maintaining habitat conditions for a broad suite of forest-dependent bird species over time. Moreover, given the diversity in forest stakeholders across the...
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Spruce-fir forests and associated bird species are recognized as some of the most vulnerable ecosystems and species to the impacts of climate change. This work capitalized on a rich suite of long-term data from these ecosystems to document recent trends in these forests and their associated bird species and developed tools for predicting their future abundance under climate change. Findings from this work indicate declining trends in the abundance of spruce-fir obligate birds, including Bicknell’s Thrush, across the Lake States and New England. In contrast, montane spruce-fir forests in the White and Green Mountains of New England exhibited patterns of increasing abundance, potentially due to their recovery from...
Abstract (from Ecological Applications): Black ash wetlands cover approximately 1.2 million ha of wetland forest in the western Great Lakes region, providing critical habitat for wildlife. The future of these wetlands is critically threatened by a variety of factors, including emerald ash borer (Agrilus planipennis; emerald ash borer [EAB]), which has been eliminating native populations of otherwise healthy ash throughout the Great Lakes region since it was discovered in 2002. To quantify the potential impacts of tree mortality from EAB on wildlife communities, we measured seasonal bird, mammal, and amphibian diversity in black ash wetlands using a dual approach: (1) documenting bird and amphibian species across...
Categories: Publication; Types: Citation
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The State Wildlife Action Plans (SWAPs) are proactive planning documents, known as “comprehensive wildlife conservation strategies.” SWAPs assess the health of each state’s wildlife and habitats, identify current management and conservation challenges, and outline needed actions to conserve natural resources over the long term. SWAPs are revised every 10 years, with the last revision in 2015 and the next revision anticipated in 2025. While state managers have a long history of managing for threats such as land-use change, pollution, and harvest, they have expressed a lack of expertise and capacity to keep pace with the rapid advances in climate science. This makes the prospect of integrating climate information...
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Severe droughts cause widespread tree mortality and decreased growth in forests across the globe—even in areas with cooler climates. Mitigating the negative effects of climate change, in particular increased drought frequency and severity, poses a major challenge to forest managers. Managers are searching for strategies that minimize the negative effects of drought on forests (i.e. increase their resistance to drought) and maximize the ability of forests to recover after a drought (i.e. improve their resilience). Evidence suggests that forests with certain combinations of tree species, sizes, and stem densities are better able to withstand and recover from drought. The goal of this study was to identify which...
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Black ash wetlands occupy over 1.2 million hectares of forest in the Great Lakes region, providing habitat for unique and diverse wildlife communities. In these wetlands, black ash trees are a foundational species, regulating all aspects of ecosystem function, and are also an important cultural resource for Native Americans, specifically for basket-makers. Black ash wetlands are critically threatened by the interaction of climate change and the invasive emerald ash borer (EAB), which is expected to spread northward and westward into large expanses of black ash with warming winters. These threats present a significant challenge for long-term conservation efforts to preserve ecosystem functions, cultural lifeways,...
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Overview This project examines the ecological impacts of several introduced and expanding forest insects and diseases on forest habitats across the northeastern US and upper Lake States region. To address these novel threats, this work applies large-scale, co-developed experimental studies documenting impacts of ash mortality from emerald ash borer on lowland black ash communities in the Lake States and northern hardwood forests in New England; regional assessments of the impacts of the climate change-mediated expansion of southern pine beetle into northeastern pine barren communities; and ecological characterizations of areas experiencing suppression efforts to reduce the spread of the introduced Asian long-horned...
Climate change and associated stressors are expected to greatly impact the ability of forest managers to sustainably manage and conserve forest habitats across the northeastern United States. As a result, adaptation strategies are being developed and applied in many regions to minimize climate change impacts and sustain key forest functions under uncertain future environmental conditions. Given that many of these strategies deviate from traditional approaches to forest management, there is a great need for field evaluations of adaptation in practice to inform long-term planning efforts to address climate change impacts. Similarly, the long timeframes over which forests develop and management actions operate has...
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Forests across the U.S. are experiencing unprecedented tree mortality caused by a variety of stressors, including invasive insects, disease, extreme weather, wildfires, and droughts. For example, the emerald ash borer, a nonnative insect, has killed tens of millions of trees in the Lake States region of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan alone in the past decade. Tree die offs alter the structure of forests, making them less-suitable habitat for many species, and decrease their ability to perform important ecosystem functions, such as carbon sequestration. Climate change further threatens already damaged forests, as shifting temperature and precipitation conditions alter species’ range limits. To prevent additional...
Abstract (from http://forestry.oxfordjournals.org/content/87/5/629.abstract): 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-scale modelling approaches lacking field measurements. 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 employing per cent cover estimates of UVEG from a region-wide...
map background search result map search result map Modeling Effects of Climate Change on Spruce-Fir Forest Ecosystems and Associated Priority Bird Populations Informing and Evaluating Forest Management Strategies to Promote Drought Resistance Identifying and Evaluating Adaptation Science for Forest Habitats and Bird Communities in the Northeast Exploring the Potential for Adaptive Tree Plantings to Restore and Sustain Forest Habitats Across the Upper Lake States Assessing the Impacts of Emerald Ash Borer and Adaptation Strategies on Habitat Quality for At Risk Wildlife in Black Ash Forests A Regional Synthesis of Climate Data to Inform the 2025 State Wildlife Action Plans in the Northeast U.S. Developing Climate Calendars to Inform Invasive Species Management in the Northeast Impacts and Adaptation Strategies for Invasive Forest Insects and Diseases in the Northeast A Synthesis of Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment Rankings for Species of Greatest Conservation Need in the Northeast US from 2010-2023 Modeling Effects of Climate Change on Spruce-Fir Forest Ecosystems and Associated Priority Bird Populations Assessing the Impacts of Emerald Ash Borer and Adaptation Strategies on Habitat Quality for At Risk Wildlife in Black Ash Forests Exploring the Potential for Adaptive Tree Plantings to Restore and Sustain Forest Habitats Across the Upper Lake States A Regional Synthesis of Climate Data to Inform the 2025 State Wildlife Action Plans in the Northeast U.S. Developing Climate Calendars to Inform Invasive Species Management in the Northeast Impacts and Adaptation Strategies for Invasive Forest Insects and Diseases in the Northeast A Synthesis of Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment Rankings for Species of Greatest Conservation Need in the Northeast US from 2010-2023 Identifying and Evaluating Adaptation Science for Forest Habitats and Bird Communities in the Northeast Informing and Evaluating Forest Management Strategies to Promote Drought Resistance