| Abstract: Climate change forecasts predict that the northeastern U.S. will see both an increase in total annual rainfall and a higher frequency of prolonged dry spells. The extreme drought that affected much of New England during the summer of 2016 served as first glimpse of what such a future climate may look like. This webinar presents the results from ongoing research in our lab focused on understanding the impacts of climate change, especially drought, on northern forests. Additionally, we also consider the potential impacts of climate change on the capacity of northern forests to provide important ecosystem services to the region’s communities, such as water resources, the production of timber, maple syrup, and other forest products, hydrologic regulation, and carbon storage. Specifically, this webinar presents results from research conducted across the northeast, as well as from several long-term experiments in New Hampshire. We show that across the region, trees growing in warmer climates (PA, WV) exhibit greater sensitivity to moisture stress compared to trees growing in the northern states (ME, VT, NH, NY), and that species differ significantly in responses to different climate variables. We also found that during the height of the drought in late August and early September, white pine, hemlock, and red oak trees experienced severe moisture stress, as indicated by the almost complete cessation of water uptake. However, red oak exhibited less drought sensitivity, as indicated by its ability to continue photosynthesizing even when soils were very dry. We conclude by discussing the implications of these findings for the sustainability and management of New Hampshire’s forests for diverse ecosystem services in the face of future climate change. |
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Center for Research on Sustainable Forests