Rapid: Assessing Temporal Dynamics of Disturbance Interactions as a Driver of a Novel Forest Mortality Event

快速：评估干扰相互作用的时间动态作为新型森林死亡事件的驱动因素

• 批准号: 1917705
• 负责人: Robert Fahey
• 金额: $ 5.78万
• 依托单位: University of Connecticut
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2019-03-01 至 2020-02-29
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1917705&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Rapid; Assessing; Temporal; Dynamics; Disturbance

In many forested regions of the world, disturbances caused by introduced pests and pathogens, along with changing climatic conditions, has resulted in forest health impacts. As these types of disturbances become more frequent, the interactions between them can greatly amplify the impacts on forest health and sustainability. This project will study an unprecedented, ongoing forest mortality event that affects oak-dominated forests in southern New England. Tree mortaility appears to be related to the interaction of both drought and multiple canopy defoliations by non-native Gypsy Moth caterpillars. This project will evaluate how the timing and interactions of those disturbances matters in forest health. The research will assess if areas that have greater tree mortality are those that experienced the most intense initial drought or if they underwent defoliation closer in time to the drought. The results of the project will be very valuable to forest stakeholders, helping them understand the underlying causes of the tree mortality event and potentially allowing prediction of future impacts. The investigators are highly engaged with the regional forest management community and the results of the project will be used in planning forest management strategies including tree removals related to this mortality event. The project is important as it will communicate the potential ramifications for wood products markets, forestry and arboriculture practices, and general forest use by the public. Interactions between climate-mediated disturbances, such as droughts, and biotic disturbances, such as defoliating insect pests, are increasingly driving continental-scale forest structure and function. However, the temporal lags associated with drought effects on biotic disturbance are not well understood and empirical data to address this topic are lacking. The central hypothesis of this project is that the effect of interacting drought and defoliation disturbance will be mediated by temporal proximity between disturbances and initial drought severity. The project will combine high temporal and spatial resolution remote sensing analysis with dendrochronological reconstruction of forest growth patterns to assess how the timing and severity of interacting disturbances affects patterns of disturbance resistance, forest productivity, and tree mortality in temperate forest ecosystems. The study will be conducted in a network of forest stands, identified through the remote sensing analysis, which will be replicated across categories of defoliation timing in relation to the initial drought disturbance. The results of the project will support hypothesis generation, model parameterization, and general conceptual frameworks for future experimental and modeling studies that can evaluate the mechanistic basis for, and consequences of, disturbance interactions in terrestrial ecosystems.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

在世界许多森林地区，引入的害虫和病原体以及气候状况的变化引起的障碍导致了森林健康的影响。随着这些类型的干扰变得越来越频繁，它们之间的相互作用可以极大地扩大对森林健康和可持续性的影响。该项目将研究一个前所未有的持续森林死亡事件，影响新英格兰南部的橡树主导森林。树木的可压力似乎与非本地吉普赛蛾毛毛虫的干旱和多个冠层落叶的相互作用有关。该项目将评估这些干扰的时间和相互作用在森林健康方面的重要性。该研究将评估树木死亡率更高的地区是那些经历了最严重的初始干旱的地区，还是及时接近干旱的区域。该项目的结果对于森林利益相关者将非常有价值，帮助他们了解树木死亡事件的根本原因，并有可能预测未来的影响。调查人员高度与区域森林管理社区互动，该项目的结果将用于计划森林管理策略，包括与此死亡率事件有关的树木去除。该项目很重要，因为它将传达木材产品市场，林业和树木栽培实践的潜在影响以及公众的一般森林使用。气候介导的干旱（例如干旱）和生物障碍（例如脱叶虫害）之间的相互作用越来越多地推动大陆规模的森林结构和功能。但是，与干旱对生物障碍的影响相关的时间滞后尚不清楚，并且缺乏解决该主题的经验数据。该项目的核心假设是，相互作用的干旱和脱叶干扰的效果将由干扰和初始干旱严重程度之间的时间接近介导。该项目将结合较高的时间和空间分辨率遥感分析与森林生长模式的DendroConological重建，以评估相互作用干扰的时间和严重性如何影响温带森林生态系统中的障碍抗性，森林生产力和树木死亡率的模式。这项研究将在森林林网络中进行，通过遥感分析确定，该分析将在与初始干旱干扰有关的落叶时间上复制。该项目的结果将支持假设的产生，模型参数化和一般概念框架，用于未来的实验和建模研究，可以评估地面生态系统中干扰相互作用的机械基础和后果。这奖反映了NSF的法规任务，并认为通过基金会的知识优点和广泛的criter criter criter criter crietia crietia criter criter criteria criter criteria criter criteria criter criteria criteria criteria crietia crietia criteria criteria criteria criteria criteria均值得一提。