Changes in growing season climate are often the foci of research exploring forest response to climate change. By contrast, little is known about tree growth response to projected declines in winter snowpack and increases in soil freezing in seasonally snow‐covered forest ecosystems, despite extensive documentation of the importance of winter climate in mediating ecological processes. We conducted a 5‐year snow‐removal experiment whereby snow was removed for the first 4–5 weeks of winter in a northern hardwood forest at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest in New Hampshire,
Climate change creates a variety of novel stressors for species, such as a decline in snowpack. Loss of snow has many impacts, including the loss of thermal insulation of soils. Winter/spring freezing of soils has been tied to forest mass mortality in multiple locations around the world. Many species, however, can take alternative growth forms, such as tall tree forms and short shrub-like forms. Shrub-forms may provide a unique protection from the snow loss phenomenon by providing a similar thermal insulation as snowpack. That hypothesis is tested here using yellow-cedar, a species undergoing mass mortality due to snow loss. Temperature loggers were placed under both tree- and shrub-form cedars, including areas where the species was experimentally removed. The number of soil freezing days was high in open areas, areas of tree mortality, and where the shrub-form was removed, but was almost zero in areas where the shrub-form was left intact. This suggests that growth-form temperature moderation is possible and may provide an important resistance to the mortality mechanism. In other areas around the world where snow loss is resulting in soil freezing and mortality, growth forms should be investigated as a potential moderating mechanism for this particular climate change stress.
more » « less- PAR ID:
- 10494112
- Publisher / Repository:
- Oxford Academic
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Forest Science
- Volume:
- 68
- Issue:
- 5-6
- ISSN:
- 0015-749X
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 435 to 439
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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Abstract USA . Our results indicate that adverse impacts of reduced snowpack and increased soil freezing on the physiology ofAcer saccharum (sugar maple), a dominant species across northern temperate forests, are accompanied by a 40 ± 3% reduction in aboveground woody biomass increment, averaged across the 6 years following the start of the experiment. Further, we find no indication of growth recovery 1 year after cessation of the experiment. Based on these findings, we integrate spatial modeling of snowpack depth with forest inventory data to develop a spatially explicit, regional‐scale assessment of the vulnerability of forest aboveground growth to projected declines in snowpack depth and increased soil frost. These analyses indicate that nearly 65% of sugar maple basal area in the northeastern United States resides in areas that typically experience insulating snowpack. However, under theRCP 4.5 and 8.5 emissions scenarios, we project a 49%–95% reduction in forest area experiencing insulating snowpack by the year 2099 in the northeastern United States, leaving large areas of northern forest vulnerable to these changes in winter climate, particularly along the northern edge of the region. Our study demonstrates that research focusing on growing season climate alone overestimates the stimulatory effect of warming temperatures on tree and forest growth in seasonally snow‐covered forests. -
The climate is changing in many temperate forests with the amount of forest area dominated by sugar maple experiencing an insulating snowpack expected to shrink between 49 and 95% compared to 1951-2005 values. A reduced snowpack and increased depth and duration of soil frost can injure or kill fine roots, which are essential for plant water and nutrient uptake. These adverse impacts on tree roots can have important impacts on tree growth and ecosystem carbon sequestration. We evaluated the effects of changing winter climate, including snow and soil frost dynamics, by using tree cores to measure sugar maple radial growth rates in the Soil Freezing Study plots at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest. These data were gathered as part of the Hubbard Brook Ecosystem Study (HBES). The HBES is a collaborative effort at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest, which is operated and maintained by the USDA Forest Service, Northern Research Station. Analysis of these data are published in: Reinmann AB, Susser JR, Demara EMC, and Templer PH. 2019. Declines in northern forest tree growth following snowpack decline and soil freezing. Global Change Biology. 25(2):420-430. https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.14420more » « less
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Climate models for the northeastern United States (U.S.) over the next century predict an increase in air temperature between 2.8 and 4.3 °C and a decrease in the average number of days per year when a snowpack will cover the forest floor (Hayhoe et al. 2007, 2008; Campbell et al. 2010). Studies of forest dynamics in seasonally snow-covered ecosystems have been primarily conducted during the growing season, when most biological activity occurs. However, in recent years considerable progress has been made in our understanding of how winter climate change influences dynamics in these forests. The snowpack insulates soil from below-freezing air temperatures, which facilitates a significant amount of microbial activity. However, a smaller snowpack and increased depth and duration of soil frost amplify losses of dissolved organic C and NO3- in leachate, as well as N2O released into the atmosphere. The increase in nutrient loss following increased soil frost cannot be explained by changes in microbial activity alone. More likely, it is caused by a decrease in plant nutrient uptake following increases in soil frost. We conducted a snow-removal experiment at Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest to determine the effects of a smaller winter snowpack and greater depth and duration of soil frost on trees, soil microbes, and arthropods. A number of publications have been based on these data: Comerford et al. 2013, Reinmann et al. 2019, Templer 2012, and Templer et al. 2012. These data were gathered as part of the Hubbard Brook Ecosystem Study (HBES). The HBES is a collaborative effort at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest, which is operated and maintained by the USDA Forest Service, Northern Research Station. Campbell JL, Ollinger SV, Flerchinger GN, Wicklein H, Hayhoe K, Bailey AS. Past and projected future changes in snowpack and soil frost at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest, New Hampshire, USA. Hydrological Processes. 2010; 24:2465–2480. Comerford DP, PG Schaberg, PH Templer, AM Socci, JL Campbell, and KF Wallin. 2013. Influence of experimental snow removal on root and canopy physiology of sugar maple trees in a northern hardwood forest. Oecologia 171:261-269. Hayhoe K, Wake CP, Huntington TG, Luo LF, Schwartz MD, Sheffield J, et al. Past and future changes in climate and hydrological indicators in the US Northeast. Climate Dynamics. 2007; 28:381–407. Hayhoe, K., Wake, C., Anderson, B. et al. Regional climate change projections for the Northeast USA. Mitig Adapt Strateg Glob Change 13, 425–436 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11027-007-9133-2. Reinmann AB, J Susser, EMC Demaria, PH Templer. 2019. Declines in northern forest tree growth following snowpack decline and soil freezing. Global Change Biology 25:420-430. Templer PH. 2012. Changes in winter climate: soil frost, root injury, and fungal communities (Invited). Plant and Soil 35: 15-17 Templer PH , AF Schiller, NW Fuller, AM Socci, JL Campbell, JE Drake, and TH Kunz. 2012. Impact of a reduced winter snowpack on litter arthropod abundance and diversity in a northern hardwood forest ecosystem. Biology and Fertility of Soils 48:413-424.more » « less
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The deciduous shrub
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