Taller trees, denser stands and greater biomass in semi-deciduous than in evergreen lowland central African forests

Fayolle, Adeline; Panzou, Grâce Jopaul Loubota; Drouet, Thomas; Swaine, M. D.; Bauwens, Sébastien; Vleminckx, Jason; Biwolé, Achille Bernard; Lejeune, Philippe; Doucet, Jean‐Louis

doi:10.1016/j.foreco.2016.04.033

Cited by 56 publications

(77 citation statements)

References 48 publications

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“…62.06%, 30.34% and 28.27% respectively, suggested that they were the leading dominant species of this forest. In particular, the first species is typical of the evergreen lowland terra firma forests as mentioned by Fayolle et al, (2016). Evergreen Congo basin forest led by C. mildbraedii was also mentioned in Gabon by Nasi et al, (2012) and in Central Africa Countries by Feldpausch et al, (2011).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

“…Basal area is the area of a given section of land that is occupied by the cross-section of tree trunks and stems at the base (Feldpausch et al, 2011;Ekoungoulou, 2014;Folega et al, 2014;Fayolle et al, 2016). Measurement taken at the diameter at breast height (1.3m) of tree above the ground and include the complete of every tree, including the bark (Lopez-Gonzalez et al, 2011).…”

Section: Basal Area (Ba)mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Congo basin forests located in central Africa are the world's second largest tropical forest, after the Amazonian basin, with a wide plant species diversity, storing enormous carbon amounts and provide an irreplaceable source of ecological, social and economic services for local populations, states and the international community (Lewis et al, 2013;Ekoungoulou et al, 2015;Fayolle et al, 2016). Like the others, the Congo basin forests are confronted with global changes such as increased anthropogenic pressures (Logging, land conversion, mining), changes in the rainfall regime that risk in the near future to cause their degradation and fragmentation, and the partial or complete loss of the functions and services they perform today (FAO, 2016;STC, 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Ecological and Structural Analyses of Trees in an Evergreen Lowland Congo Basin Forest

Ekoungoulou¹,

Nzala²,

Liu³

et al. 2017

IJB

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Floristic inventory and diversity assessments are necessary to understand the present diversity status and conservation of forest biodiversity. Studying the variation height-diameter woody provides insight into the general characteristics of the trees diversity pattern. This study mainly focuses on aimed to assess the effectiveness of trees diversity and structure in two study sites. The study was conducted at Ipendja evergreen lowland moist forest in northern Republic of Congo. The sampling design was systematic consisted of parallel transect 1 or 2 km part, and divided into consecutive rectangular plots, each 5000m 2 (25 x 200 m, i.e. 0.5 ha). Within eight plots censuses, all trees with a DBH ≥ 10 cm were identified and measured. A total of 1340 trees has been recorded belonged 145 species and 36 families (n = 607 and n = 733, respectively in Mokelimwaekili and Sombo sites). The results show that the leading botanical families were Sapotaceae follows by Euphorbiaceae, Meliaceae, Caesalpiniaceae, Sterculiaceae, Annonaceae and Rubiaceae. The most representative species were C. mildbraedii, S. kamerunensis and P. oliveri, i.e. 62.06%, 30.34% and 28.27% respectively, demonstrated that they were the leading dominant species of this forest ecosystem. Shannon index were 4.29 bits for Mokelimwaekili and 4.22 bits for Sombo. While Pielou's evenness index was between 0.88 and 0.90, respectively for the Mokelimwaekili and Sombo sites. The similarity coefficient for Jaccard was 62% and 58% for Sorensen. There are highlight variations in tree diversity indices across sites and plots in Ipendja forest.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Section: Basal Area (Ba)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Ecological and Structural Analyses of Trees in an Evergreen Lowland Congo Basin Forest

Ekoungoulou¹,

Nzala²,

Liu³

et al. 2017

IJB

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“…Therefore, Models developed by [18] [35] are now the standard models for measuring carbon stocks in tropical forests [23]. To estimate carbon stock, the biomass (above-and below-ground biomass) were devised by two to obtain the carbon for each plot [2].…”

Section: Trees Processing Overviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Tropical forests are highly diverse ecosystems that play a key role in the global carbon cycle [1] [8] [18] [19] [20] [21]. A considerable amount of data on aboveground biomass (AGB) stored in alive trees in lowland tropical forests, and the factors affecting it, have become available in the past few years [1] [22] [23]. [3] proposed a scheme where different allometric models should be used depending on vegetation type and on the availability of total tree height information.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tree Biomass Estimation in Central African Forests Using Allometric Models

Ekoungoulou¹,

Nzala²,

Liu³

et al. 2018

OJE

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Quantifying the tropical forests' carbon stocks is presently an important component in the implementation of the emerging carbon credit market mechanisms. This calls for appropriate allometric equations predicting biomass which currently are scarce. In this study, we aimed to estimate above-and below-ground biomass and carbon stocks of trees, and to identify the variation in diameter-height allometry of Ipendja mixed terra firme lowland tropical forest's trees. The study area is located at Ipendja forest management unit (UFA), close to Dongou district (Likouala Department), in Northern Republic of Congo. This study combined forest inventory data of 1340 trees recorded from eight studied plots distributed in two sites, respectively Mokelimwaekili (i.e., Old-growth forest) and Sombo (i.e., Selective logging forest). Trees measurements were done with rectangular plots, each 25 × 200 m (i.e., 0.5 ha, 5000 m 2 ). In eight studied plots (4 plots per site), only trees with DBH ≥ 10 cm were measured and identified. 1340 trees founded were belonged 145 species and 36 botanical families (n = 733 and n = 607, for Sombo and Mokelimwaekili respectively). The analyses were conducted using allometric method for aboveground biomass (AGB) and belowground biomass (BGB) estimations. The results showed that in Ipendja forest ecosystem the mean biomass is built up for AGB (346 Mg·ha ). By this study, Ipendja forest ecosystem has clearly variations on the diameter-height relationship and biomass across the plots and the sites.

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Landscape‐level validation of allometric relationships for carbon stock estimation reveals bias driven by soil type

Beirne

Miao

Núñez

et al. 2019

Ecological Applications

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Mitigation of climate change depends on accurate estimation and mapping of terrestrial carbon stocks, particularly in carbon dense tropical forests. Allometric equations can be used to robustly estimate biomass of tropical trees, but often require tree height, which is frequently unknown. Researchers and practitioners must, therefore, decide whether to directly measure a subset of tree heights to develop diameter : height (D:H) equations or rely on previously published generic equations. To date, studies comparing the two approaches have been spatially restricted and/or not randomly allocated across the landscape of interest, making the implications of deciding whether or not to measure tree heights difficult to determine. To address this issue, we use inventory data from a systematic-random forest inventory across Gabon (102 forest sites; 42,627 trees, including 7,036 height-measured trees). Using plot-specific models of D:H as a benchmark, we compare the performance of a suite of locally fitted and commonly used generic models (parameterized national, georegional, and pantropical equations) across a variety of scales, and assess which abiotic, anthropogenic, and topographical covariates contribute the most to bias in height estimation. We reveal marked spatial structure in the magnitude and direction of bias in tree height estimation using all generic models, due at least in part to soil type, which compounded to substantial error in site-level AGB estimates (of up to 38% or 150 Mg/ha). However, two generic pantropical models (Chave 2014; Feldpausch 2012) converged to within 2.5% of mean AGB at the landscape scale. Our results suggest that some (not all) pantropical equations can extrapolate AGB across large spatial scales with minimal bias in estimated mean AGB. However, extreme caution must be taken when interpreting the AGB estimates from generic models at the site-level as they fail to capture substantial spatial variation in D:H relationships, which could lead to dramatic under-or over-estimation of site-level carbon stocks. Validated allometric models derived at site-or soil-type-levels may be the best way to reduce such biases arising from landscape-level heterogeneity in D:H model fit in the Afrotropics.

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Taller trees, denser stands and greater biomass in semi-deciduous than in evergreen lowland central African forests

Cited by 56 publications

References 48 publications

Ecological and Structural Analyses of Trees in an Evergreen Lowland Congo Basin Forest

Ecological and Structural Analyses of Trees in an Evergreen Lowland Congo Basin Forest

Tree Biomass Estimation in Central African Forests Using Allometric Models

Landscape‐level validation of allometric relationships for carbon stock estimation reveals bias driven by soil type

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