Contrasting land use legacy effects on forest landscape dynamics in the Italian Alps and the Apennines

Abstract

Context: Land use legacies of human activities and recent post-abandonment forest expansion have extensively modified numerous forest landscapes throughout the European mountain ranges. Drivers of forest expansion and the effects of changes on ecosystem services are currently debated.Objectives: i) to compare landscape transition patterns of the Alps and the Apennines (Italy), ii) to quantify the dominant landscape transitions, and iii) to measure the influence of climatic, topographic and anthropogenic driving factors.Methods: Land cover changes and landscape pattern modifications were investigated at the regional (over 28 years, Alps and Apennines, Corine Land Cover dataset) and landscape scale (over 58 years, 8 Alpine and 8 Apennine sites, aerial images). The main driving factors of post-abandonment forest landscape dynamics were assessed with a statistical modeling approach.Results: Forest expansion was the dominant landscape transition at both Italian mountain ranges, with an annual overall rate of 0.6%. Forest expansion was more extensive at lower elevations in the Apennines where climate is less limiting and extensive abandoned croplands and pastures were available throughout the study period. Distance from pre-existing forest edges in the Alps and elevation in the Apennines emerged as the most important predictors.Conclusions: Forest expansion is most rapid where areas of recent agricultural abandonment coincide with favorable climatic conditions. Thus the prediction of forest landscape dynamics, in these mountain forests with a long history of cultural use, requires knowledge of how the magnitude and timing of land use changes intersect spatially and temporally with suitable conditions for tree establishment and growth.

Shrub facilitation promotes advancing of the Fagus sylvatica treeline across the Apennines (Italy)

“…The abrupt reduction of traditional agro‐pastoral practices at the highest elevations observed in Europe in the last decades has promoted shrubs and tree encroachment in the Alps and Pyrenees (Gehrig‐Fasel et al, 2007; Holtmeier & Broll, 2007; Ameztegui et al, 2016). After recent abandonment, forest expansion was observed throughout the Apennines although woody‐plant encroachment was observed to be progressively less intense at higher elevations (Malandra et al, 2019; Garbarino et al, 2020).…”

“…The odds ratio (e β 1 ) for percentage shrub cover was estimated as 1.07, which means that an increase of 1% in the canopy cover of shrubs enhanced the chances of -Fasel et al, 2007;Holtmeier & Broll, 2007;Ameztegui et al, 2016). After recent abandonment, forest expansion was observed throughout the Apennines although woodyplant encroachment was observed to be progressively less intense at higher elevations (Malandra et al, 2019;Garbarino et al, 2020).…”

Cultural Landscapes under the Threat of Climate Change: A Systematic Study of Barriers to Resilience

“…Cultural landscapes include woodlands [55], forests, water systems, vineyards, national parks [74], and archaeological and mixed sites. Additionally, considering the multi-and inter-disciplinary nature of the theme of cultural landscapes, cultural [75] and ecosystem services [76], biodiversity [23,77], vegetation and land cover [63,78], and land-use changes [79,80] should be embedded into the documentation of cultural landscapes to capture the "whole story." Along with its intangible values, it is essential to further investigate traditional ecological knowledge [81,82], traditional agricultural knowledge [83], and local fire ecology [84,85].…”

Changes in Alpine Butterfly Communities during the Last 40 Years

“…During the last decades, changes in the vegetation cover have been recorded in many mountain ecosystems. Past studies revealed changes in dominant plant species at a global scale [16], while locally they show an increase in the extent of tree and shrub coverage (since 1960, forest cover in the Italian Alps doubled its extension [17]; for differences between the Alps and Apennines see [18]; for the French Alps [19]; for the Swiss Alps [20]) and a general upwards altitudinal shift of the treeline ecotone (for the Swiss Alps [21,22]; for the southwestern French Alps [23]; for the Scandinavian Mountains [24]; for a global survey [25]), but site topography and small-scale factors might outweigh the effects of global warming ( [26]; see the "conservative" pattern of the Central European Alps [27] and references therein). On the other hand, climate change is not the only disturbing factor; therefore, assessing a direct role of global warming on these modifications is difficult in the Alps and on the hilly slopes of southern Piedmont (Italy), where landscapes have been modelled by millennia of human pressure, recently followed by changes in land use as agricultural and pastoral intensification or abandonment, or land abandonment (for the European Alps see [28,29]; for the Italian Alps [30] and Piedmont [31,32]).…”