Structural Characteristics of Old-Growth, Maturing, and Partially Cut Northern Hardwood Forests

McGee, Gregory G.; Leopold, Donald J.; Nyland, Ralph D.

doi:10.1890/1051-0761(1999)009[1316:scoogm]2.0.co;2

Cited by 178 publications

(88 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…Our results indicate that old-growth hemlock forests exhibit a higher degree of structural complexity than second-growth hemlock forests in western Massachusetts, particularly live-tree size distributions and the abundance and decay characteristics of downed coarse woody debris (CWD) and snags. These findings are consistent with other structural comparisons of secondgrowth and old-growth forest ecosystems in northeastern North America (Gore and Patterson 1986, McGee et al 1999, Ziegler 1999, Crow et al 2002 and are likely due to the differences in stand developmental history between the old-growth and second-growth stands. Specifically, the second-growth stands studied originated following stand-replacing disturbances (i.e., clear-cut harvesting) in the late 19th century, whereas the development of the old-growth areas had been primarily FIG.…”

Section: Comparisons Between Successional Stagessupporting

confidence: 89%

“…The limited attention that these long-term studies have given to structural attributes, such as CWD, leads to uncertainty in our understanding of the linkages between disturbance history and structural components (Kulakowski andVeblen 2003, Fraver 2004). Moreover, while there have been several characterizations of the structural attributes of oldgrowth ecosystems in northeastern North America (e.g., Gore and Patterson 1986, Tyrell and Crow 1994a, McGee et al 1999, Ziegler 2000, little attention has been paid to how variation in disturbance history may affect variation in structural attributes within these systems.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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THE INFLUENCE OF SUCCESSIONAL PROCESSES AND DISTURBANCE ON THE STRUCTURE OF TSUGA CANADENSIS FORESTS

D’Amato

Orwig

Foster

2008

Ecological Applications

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Old-growth forests are valuable sources of ecological, conservation, and management information, yet these ecosystems have received little study in New England, due in large part to their regional scarcity. To increase our understanding of the structures and processes common in these rare forests, we studied the abundance of downed coarse woody debris (CWD) and snags and live-tree size-class distributions in 16 old-growth hemlock forests in western Massachusetts. Old-growth stands were compared with eight adjacent second-growth hemlock forests to gain a better understanding of the structural differences between these two classes of forests resulting from contrasting histories. In addition, we used stand-level dendroecological reconstructions to investigate the linkages between disturbance history and old-growth forest structure using an information-theoretic model selection framework. Old-growth stands exhibit a much higher degree of structural complexity than second-growth forests. In particular, old-growth stands had larger overstory trees and greater volumes of downed coarse woody debris (135.2 vs. 33.2 m3/ha) and snags (21.2 vs. 10.7 m3/ha). Second-growth stands were characterized by either skewed unimodal or reverse-J shaped diameter distributions, while old-growth forests contained bell-shaped, skewed unimodal, rotated sigmoid, and reverse J-shaped distributions. The variation in structural attributes among old-growth stands, particularly the abundance of downed CWD, was closely related to disturbance history. In particular, old-growth stands experiencing moderate levels of canopy disturbance during the last century (1930s and 1980s) had greater accumulations of CWD, highlighting the importance of gap-scale disturbances in shaping the long-term development and structural characteristics of old-growth forests. These findings are important for the development of natural disturbance-based silvicultural systems that may be used to restore important forest characteristics lacking in New England second-growth stands by integrating structural legacies of disturbance (e.g., downed CWD) and resultant tree-size distribution patterns. This silvicultural approach would emulate the often episodic nature of CWD recruitment within old-growth forests.

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Section: Comparisons Between Successional Stagessupporting

confidence: 89%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

THE INFLUENCE OF SUCCESSIONAL PROCESSES AND DISTURBANCE ON THE STRUCTURE OF TSUGA CANADENSIS FORESTS

D’Amato

Orwig

Foster

2008

Ecological Applications

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“…Although total basal area of the overstory was similar between managed and Preserve catchments in this study, tree size and quantities of dead wood were lower at managed sites, accompanied by greater sapling densities (Table 2), which reflect the expected structural characteristics of regenerating forests (Reiners 1992;Gilliam et al 1995;Hardt & Swank 1997;McGee et al 1999;Ziegler 2000;Dieterich et al 2006). The plant species richness of the study catchments is comparable to other regions of the temperate northeastern forest.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 68%

“…Both the structure and composition of forest communities can change dramatically during recovery from disturbance, with the roles of individual species changing, the increasing role of overstory vegetation, the decreasing role of the understory in regeneration, and the establishment of shade-tolerant understory plants and standing and fallen dead wood pools. The total basal area of trees in a stand tends to increase with stand age, while overall density tends to decrease as individual stems get larger (Gilliam et al 1995;Liptzin & Ashton 1999;McGee et al 1999;Ziegler 2000;Niklas et al 2003). Sapling density and productivity are greater during the early regenerating stages of a stand, and decline as overstory trees become established (Reiners 1992;Gilliam et al 1995;Ziegler 2000;Dieterich et al 2006).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Sapling density and productivity are greater during the early regenerating stages of a stand, and decline as overstory trees become established (Reiners 1992;Gilliam et al 1995;Ziegler 2000;Dieterich et al 2006). Quantities of standing and fallen dead wood, particularly that in an advanced stage of decay, tend to be greater in older forests, representing an important component of habitat heterogeneity both for establishment of seedlings and understory vegetation (Hardt & Swank 1997;McGee et al 1999;Ziegler 2000). Intact forests are important in the conservation of considerable numbers of vegetation species (Peterken & Game 1984;Duffy & Meier 1992;Wulf 1997;Hermy et al 1999), and other community components that utilize forest vegetation as food and/or habitat (i.e.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Land use designation and vegetation community structure in the Adirondack uplands (New York, USA)

Woodcock

Evans

Laxson

et al. 2008

Applied Vegetation Science

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Question: Does forest vegetation community structure reflect legislative land use designations? Location: Adirondack Park, New York, USA. Methods: The Adirondack Park, located in northern New York State, is a mixture of public and private lands, with state‐owned Forest Preserve lands comprising ca. 42% of the 2.4 million ha, on which timber harvesting and many other forms of anthropogenic disturbance are prohibited. A survey of vegetation communities was conducted in eighteen upland catchments with differing land use history (managed and Forest Preserve), including overstory, understory, and dead wood (snags and downed woody debris) using randomly placed plots. Results: Mean overstory density and basal area were not significantly different between land uses, although mean overstory tree size was greater in Preserve catchments. Sapling densities were greater in managed catchments, while mean herb/shrub coverage was not affected by land use. Densities of 25% of common species were affected by land use, determined by GIS coverages constructed using an Inverse Distance Weighted estimation procedure. Discriminant Analysis of per‐plot plant community data correctly classified 89% of both managed and Preserve plots. Conclusion: The success of the Discriminant Analysis in classifying land uses based on vegetation communities indicates its potential utility of this method in comparing forest vegetation to a reference condition in this and other areas. The analysis suggests that at least 85 years is required for Adirondack up‐land catchments to recover following harvesting. Uncertainty in classification was related to heterogenous management and disturbance patterns within catchments.

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Estimating uncertainty in the volume and carbon storage of downed coarse woody debris

Campbell

Green

Yanai

et al. 2019

Ecological Applications

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Downed coarse woody debris, also known as coarse woody detritus or downed dead wood, is challenging to estimate for many reasons, including irregular shapes, multiple stages of decay, and the difficulty of identifying species. In addition, some properties are commonly not measured, such as wood density and carbon concentration. As a result, there have been few previous evaluations of uncertainty in estimates of downed coarse woody debris, which are necessary for analysis and interpretation of the data. To address this shortcoming, we quantified uncertainties in estimates of downed coarse woody debris volume and carbon storage using data collected from permanent forest inventory plots in the northeastern United States by the Forest Inventory and Analysis program of the USDA Forest Service. Quality assurance data collected from blind remeasurement audits were used to quantify error in diameter measurements, hollowness of logs, species identification, and decay class determination. Uncertainty estimates for density, collapse ratio, and carbon concentration were taken from the literature. Estimates of individual sources of uncertainty were combined using Monte Carlo methods. Volume estimates were more reliable than carbon storage, with an average 95% confidence interval of 15.9 m3/ha across the 79 plots evaluated, which was less than the mean of 31.2 m3/ha. Estimates of carbon storage (and mass) were more uncertain, due to poorly constrained estimates of the density of wood. For carbon storage, the average 95% confidence interval was 11.1 Mg C/ha, which was larger than the mean of 4.6 Mg C/ha. Accounting for the collapse of dead wood as it decomposes would improve estimates of both volume and carbon storage. On the other hand, our analyses suggest that consideration of the hollowness of downed coarse woody debris pieces could be eliminated in this region, with little effect. This study demonstrates how uncertainty analysis can be used to quantify confidence in estimates and to help identify where best to allocate resources to improve monitoring designs.

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Structural Characteristics of Old-Growth, Maturing, and Partially Cut Northern Hardwood Forests

Cited by 178 publications

References 42 publications

THE INFLUENCE OF SUCCESSIONAL PROCESSES AND DISTURBANCE ON THE STRUCTURE OF TSUGA CANADENSIS FORESTS

THE INFLUENCE OF SUCCESSIONAL PROCESSES AND DISTURBANCE ON THE STRUCTURE OF TSUGA CANADENSIS FORESTS

Land use designation and vegetation community structure in the Adirondack uplands (New York, USA)

Estimating uncertainty in the volume and carbon storage of downed coarse woody debris

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