A Review of Ungulate Impacts on the Success of Climate-Adapted Forest Management Strategies

Champagne, Émilie; Raymond, Patricia; Royo, Alejandro A.; Speed, James D. M.; Tremblay, Jean‐Pierre; Côté, Steeve D.

doi:10.1007/s40725-021-00148-5

Cited by 18 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 132 publications

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“…Notably, oaks, which constitute an important part of the landscapes' NPV, and are favoured by climate change (Mette et al, 2013), were excluded from the emergent species pool due to their high palatability (Petersson et al, 2019). This indicates that selective browsing pressure could hinder the expected adaptive shifts in community composition in response to climate change, as it has already been observed in some regions in North America and Europe (Beguin et al, 2016;Champagne et al, 2021;Côté et al, 2004). However, none of the tested combinations of browsing pressure with climate change resulted in the initially hypothesized critical loss of resilience characterized by a persisting reduction in forest carbon or a regeneration failure, as it has been identified, for example, in some fire-prone systems (Enright et al, 2015;Hansen et al, 2018).…”

Section: Community Composition and Forest Structurementioning

confidence: 95%

“…Herbivory can trigger cascading effects on tree species composition, ground vegetation, tree regeneration (Bernes et al., 2018; Kuijper, 2011), and different vertebrate and invertebrate communities (Foster et al., 2014). Despite the significance of herbivory increases as game populations become more abundant (Champagne et al., 2021; Morellet et al., 2011), these effects have received considerably less attention compared to stand‐replacing disturbances such as windthrows and wildfires. Since the 1960s, there has been a significant increase in herbivore populations in Europe (Apollonio et al., 2017; Spitzer et al., 2020), which mainly concerned Cervus elaphus L., Capreolus capreolus L., Alces alces L., Ovis aries subsp.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Ungulate browsing has been identified as a direct threat to forest adaptation to climate change, particularly by disabling natural adaptive responses of forest vegetation and hindering the achievement of desired species compositions through management (Champagne et al., 2021). Regeneration browsing can shift community composition toward less palatable (generally, with a higher C:N ratio) and browsing‐resistant species (Bernard et al., 2017; Fuchs et al., 2021; Katona et al., 2013).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The interacting effect of climate change and herbivory can trigger large‐scale transformations of European temperate forests

Dobor,

Baldo,

Bílek

et al. 2024

Global Change Biology

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In many regions of Europe, large wild herbivores alter forest community composition through their foraging preferences, hinder the forest's natural adaptive responses to climate change, and reduce ecosystem resilience. We investigated a widespread European forest type, a mixed forest dominated by Picea abies, which has recently experienced an unprecedented level of disturbance across the continent. Using the forest landscape model iLand, we investigated the combined effect of climate change and herbivory on forest structure, composition, and carbon and identified conditions leading to ecosystem transitions on a 300‐year timescale. Eight climate change scenarios, driven by Representative Concentration Pathways 4.5 and 8.5, combined with three levels of regeneration browsing, were tested. We found that the persistence of the current level of browsing pressure impedes adaptive changes in community composition and sustains the presence of the vulnerable yet less palatable P. abies. These development trajectories were tortuous, characterized by a high disturbance intensity. On the contrary, reduced herbivory initiated a transformation towards the naturally dominant broadleaved species that was associated with an increased forest carbon and a considerably reduced disturbance. The conditions of RCP4.5 combined with high and moderate browsing levels preserved the forest within its reference range of variability, defining the actual boundaries of resilience. The remaining combinations of browsing and climate change led to ecosystem transitions. Under RCP4.5 with browsing effects excluded, the new equilibrium conditions were achieved within 120 years, whereas the stabilization was delayed by 50–100 years under RCP8.5 with higher browsing intensities. We conclude that forests dominated by P. abies are prone to transitions driven by climate change. However, reducing herbivory can set the forest on a stable and predictable trajectory, whereas sustaining the current browsing levels can lead to heightened disturbance activity, extended transition times, and high variability in the target conditions.

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Section: Community Composition and Forest Structurementioning

confidence: 95%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The interacting effect of climate change and herbivory can trigger large‐scale transformations of European temperate forests

Dobor,

Baldo,

Bílek

et al. 2024

Global Change Biology

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“…It favors the natural regeneration of trees (Brang et al, 2014;Brüllhardt et al, 2022), resulting in uneven-aged forests bearing a high species and structural diversity, which are generally more resilient to disturbance and climate change than even-aged forests (Bauhus et al, 2013;Hof et al, 2017). However, natural regeneration does not lead to climate adapted forests per se, as tree species presumably adapted to the future climate are often missing in these forests, for example because they are outcompeted by dominant tree species such as beech (Ligot et al, 2013;Dietz et al, 2022) or because they are preferentially consumed by browsing ungulates (Champagne et al, 2021;Angst and Kupferschmid, 2023). Recently, forest managers have started to implement adaptive measures, in particular through the introduction of tree species, i.e., assisted migration (Williams and Dumroese, 2013).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Swiss common garden network: testing assisted migration of tree species in Europe

Streit,

Brang,

Frei

2024

Front. For. Glob. Change

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A warmer climate with drier summers will affect the suitability of tree species in their current range in most of Europe. To preserve ecosystem services in the future, many European countries are looking for tree species adapted to the expected future climate and are setting up trials to test them in different environments. In collaboration with forest practitioners and federal and regional authorities, we have established a network of 57 common gardens across large environmental gradients in Switzerland. Over a period of 30 to 50 years, the vitality, growth and survival of 18 tree species from 117 seed sources will be monitored to develop tree species recommendations for forest managers. In this article, we outline the considerations, challenges and trade-offs involved in designing this experiment, as well as the participatory process with a variety of stakeholders, from local foresters to the Federal Office for the Environment. Further, we list experiments testing multiple species on multiple sites in Europe and compare experimental designs, tree species and environmental gradients. The Swiss common garden network complements other European experiments and broadens the potential network by extending the covered environmental gradients to colder and moister conditions. Such targeted assisted migration trials are key to promoting tree species that can cope with the future climate and can help us to foster forest ecosystems that can adapt to rapidly changing climates.

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“…Consequently, browsing by large herbivores might inhibit the development of forest resilience (e.g. against climate change) by affecting long‐term tree species composition (Champagne et al, 2021 ; Meier et al, 2017 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of understory characteristics on browsing patterns of roe deer in central European mountain forests

Schwegmann,

Mörsdorf,

Bhardwaj

et al. 2023

Ecology and Evolution

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Selective browsing by deer on young trees may impede the management goal of increasing forest resilience against climate change and other disturbances. Deer population density is often considered the main driver of browsing impacts on young trees, however, a range of other variables such as food availability also affect this relationship. In this study, we use browsing survey data from 135 research plots to explore patterns of roe deer (Capreolus capreolus) browsing pressure on woody plants in mountainous forests in central Europe. We fitted species‐specific generalised linear mixed models for eight woody taxa, assessing the potential effects of understory characteristics, roe deer abundance and lying deadwood on browsing intensity. Our study reveals conspecific and associational effects for woody taxa that are intermediately browsed by roe deer. Selective browsing pressure was mediated by preferences of plants, in that, browsing of strongly preferred woody taxa as for example mountain ash (Sorbus aucuparia) and of least preferred woody taxa, for example Norway spruce (Picea abies) was not affected by the surrounding understory vegetation, while browsing pressure on intermediately browsed species like for example silver fir (Abies alba) was affected by understory characteristics. Contrary to our expectations, roe deer abundance was only positively associated with browsing pressure on silver fir and bilberry (Vaccinium myrtillus), while all other plants were unaffected by deer abundance. Finally, we did not find an influence of lying deadwood volume on the browsing pressure on any woody‐plant species. Overall, our results indicate that patterns in browsing preference and intensity are species‐specific processes and are partly affected by the surrounding understory vegetation. Current management strategies that aim to reduce browsing pressure through culling may be inefficient as they do not address other drivers of browsing pressure. However, managers also need to consider the characteristics of the local understory vegetation in addition to deer abundance and design species‐specific plans to reduce browsing on woody plant taxa.

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A Review of Ungulate Impacts on the Success of Climate-Adapted Forest Management Strategies

Cited by 18 publications

References 132 publications

The interacting effect of climate change and herbivory can trigger large‐scale transformations of European temperate forests

The interacting effect of climate change and herbivory can trigger large‐scale transformations of European temperate forests

The Swiss common garden network: testing assisted migration of tree species in Europe

Effects of understory characteristics on browsing patterns of roe deer in central European mountain forests

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