The Carbon Balance of Tropical Mountain Forests Along an Altitudinal Transect

The carbon fluxes in different successional stages: modelling the dynamics of tropical montane forests in South Ecuador

“…The data from Leuschner et al (2013) was used for calibrating the model. Another data set from Werner and Homeier (2015) for the ravine forest was used for validation.…”

“…For the RBSF study site in South Ecuador, NEE values between −1.6 and 2.2 Mg C•(ha•yr) −1 were calculated (Leuschner et al 2013, measured on three 20 m × 20 m plots), which indicated that the forest acts as either a carbon source or sink, depending upon the location of the measurement. In our forest simulations, we observed higher NEE values only in the early successional stage; in the mature forest, the NEE fluctuated around zero (0.01 ± 0.77 Mg C•(ha•yr) −1 for 10 ha).…”

“…1) •ha −1 for basal area and 2,300 individuals per hectare for overall stem density. All inventory plots have no sign of human impact and are therefore assumed to be in an old growth state (Leuschner et al 2013;Werner and Homeier 2015). A detailed description of the forest inventories used for model calibration (lower slope/ravine forest only) can be found in Additional file 1: Appendix A.…”

Tropical montane forests are a larger than expected global carbon store

“…Previous studies of AGB along elevational transects have found declining (Kitayama and Aiba, 2002;Raich et al, 2006;Girardin et al, 2010Girardin et al, , 2014aLeuschner et al, 2013), increasing (Rai and Proctor, 1986) or no (Culmsee et al, 2010;Unger et al, 2012;Girardin et al, 2014a) relationship with elevation. Regional studies suggest that elevation may not be the most important variable in explaining the variability in AGB (Slik et al, 2010;Leuschner et al, 2007), with rainfall and soil characteristics explaining more of the variability in AGB across Borneo compared to elevation.…”

“…TMF soils can also contain large amounts of carbon, similar in magnitude to the amount of AGB (e.g. Moser et al, 2011;Álvarez-Arteaga et al, 2013;Omoro et al, 2013;Leuschner et al, 2013). Our study focuses on synthesizing AGB from forest inventory plots, since insufficient data are available to include below-ground carbon as a parameter in our analysis.…”