Geology topics

Amy E. Hessl

Publications and source records attributed to Amy E. Hessl.

4 recordsLinked to original sources

USGS2014

Climate remains an important driver of post-European vegetation change in the eastern United States

The influence of climate on forest change during the past century in the eastern United States was evaluated in a recent paper (Nowacki & Abrams, 2014 ) that centers on an increase in ‘highly competitive mesophytic hardwoods’ (Nowacki & Abrams, 2008 ) and a concomitant decrease in the more xerophytic Quercus species. Nowacki & Abrams ( 2014 ) concluded that climate change has not contributed significantly to observed changes in forest composition. However, the authors restrict their focus to a single element of climate: increasing temperature since the end of the Little Ice Age ca. 150 years ago. In their study, species were binned into four classifications (e.g., Acer saccharum – ‘cool-adapted’, Acer rubrum – ‘warm-adapted’) based on average annual temperature within each species range in the United States, reducing the multifaceted character of climate into a single, categorical measure. The broad temperature classes not only veil the many biologically relevant aspects of temperature (e.g., seasonal and extreme temperatures) but they may also mask other influences, both climatic (e.g., moisture sensitivity) and nonclimatic (e.g., competition).

Global Change Biology↗

USGS2004

Interannual variability in aboveground tree growth in Stehekin River watershed, North Cascade Range, Washington

Many forests in the Pacific Northwest region of North America are both highly productive and sensitive to climate. The combination of productivity and sensitivity makes forests vulnerable to changes in future climate and most likely to feed back to the regional carbon cycle. We reconstructed basal area increment (BAI) for 20 yr using tree-ring increments and diameter to identify species-specific responses of 14 forested vegetation types in the Stehekin River watershed in the North Cascade Range, to interannual climatic variability. Mean basal area increment (MBAI) for the 20-yr period is low when the standard error is low, but as MBAI increases, the standard error (SE) is more variable. Growth at sites with both low SE and MBAI may be related to climatic variables, however, some forest types dominated by Douglas-fir and mountain hemlock are both productive and responsive to climatic variability. Many forests in the Pacific Northwest are dominated by Douglas-fir, a commercially important timber species, and as a result, may play a major role in the regional carbon balance. Douglas-fir and mountain hemlock forests in the eastern portion of the North Cascades should be carefully monitored and managed in the context of both changing climatic conditions and regional carbon budgets.

Northwest Science↗

USGS2003

Taking the pulse of mountains: Ecosystem responses to climatic variability

An integrated program of ecosystem modeling and field studies in the mountains of the Pacific Northwest (U.S.A.) has quantified many of the ecological processes affected by climatic variability. Paleoecological and contemporary ecological data in forest ecosystems provided model parameterization and validation at broad spatial and temporal scales for tree growth, tree regeneration and treeline movement. For subalpine tree species, winter precipitation has a strong negative correlation with growth; this relationship is stronger at higher elevations and west-side sites (which have more precipitation). Temperature affects tree growth at some locations with respect to length of growing season (spring) and severity of drought at drier sites (summer). Furthermore, variable but predictable climate-growth relationships across elevation gradients suggest that tree species respond differently to climate at different locations, making a uniform response of these species to future climatic change unlikely. Multi-decadal variability in climate also affects ecosystem processes. Mountain hemlock growth at high-elevation sites is negatively correlated with winter snow depth and positively correlated with the winter Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) index. At low elevations, the reverse is true. Glacier mass balance and fire severity are also linked to PDO. Rapid establishment of trees in subalpine ecosystems during this century is increasing forest cover and reducing meadow cover at many subalpine locations in the western U.S.A. and precipitation (snow depth) is a critical variable regulating conifer expansion. Lastly, modeling potential future ecosystem conditions suggests that increased climatic variability will result in increasing forest fire size and frequency, and reduced net primary productivity in drier, east-side forest ecosystems. As additional empirical data and modeling output become available, we will improve our ability to predict the effects of climatic change across a broad range of climates and mountain ecosystems in the northwestern U.S.A.

Idaho, Montana, Washington↗

USGS2001

Recent growth of conifer species of western North America: Assessing spatial patterns of radial growth trends

We explored spatial patterns of low-frequency variability in radial tree growth among western North American conifer species and identified predictors of the variability in these patterns. Using 185 sites from the International Tree-Ring Data Bank, each of which contained 10a??60 raw ring-width series, we rebuilt two chronologies for each site, using two conservative methods designed to retain any low-frequency variability associated with recent environmental change. We used factor analysis to identify regional low-frequency patterns in site chronologies and estimated the slope of the growth trend since 1850 at each site from a combination of linear regression and time-series techniques. This slope was the response variable in a regression-tree model to predict the effects of environmental gradients and species-level differences on growth trends. Growth patterns at 27 sites from the American Southwest were consistent with quasi-periodic patterns of drought. Either 12 or 32 of the 185 sites demonstrated patterns of increasing growth between 1850 and 1980 A.D., depending on the standardization technique used. Pronounced growth increases were associated with high-elevation sites (above 3000 m) and high-latitude sites in maritime climates. Future research focused on these high-elevation and high-latitude sites should address the precise mechanisms responsible for increased 20th century growth.

Canadian Journal of Forest Research↗