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FROM : tryis-blog
https://surroundingw.tumblr.com/archive - On ‘Archive’ top bar, choose your TAG themes -posts since 2020
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Growing the Forests of the Future
Excerpt from this story from the Sierra Club:
While the epic migrations of salmon, humpback whales, and wildebeests are world-renowned, animals aren’t the only species on the move. Trees, it turns out, can migrate too. Of course, an individual tree can’t pick up its roots and travel south for the winter, but trees do move—in their own way.
Katie Nigro, a postdoctoral fellow with the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education (ORISE), explained that trees expand their range in response to environmental changes. If the climate gets warmer, a tree species may no longer be able to grow in the southernmost parts of its range, but, through wind or animal-dispersed seeds, it can expand farther north over time into areas that were previously too cold.
However, that process might be too slow for human-caused climate change. To keep pace, projections suggest, seeds would need to be dispersed at least 10 times faster than their historic migration rates of about 20 to 40 kilometers (12 to 25 miles) per century. Given the quickening rate of environmental changes and the slow rate of tree growth, researchers believe trees will struggle to adapt.
To help, scientists are taking seeds from habitats they expect will no longer be suitable to a species and planting them in climates that may favor their growth in the coming century. For example, an ecosystem in Colorado that is currently ideal for a Douglas fir could become too warm to sustain it in a few decades, but that fir might thrive somewhere farther north.
Assisted migration is about planning for the future, explained Mike Battaglia, a research forester at the US Department of Agriculture’s Rocky Mountain Research Station, which also runs ORISE. His work in silviculture—the growth and development of forests—involves figuring out which species to plant in reforestation efforts.
“Trees live a long time and take a long time to get to reproductive age,” said Battaglia. Because they have such long lifespans, trees have less opportunity than faster-growing plants and animals to evolve and naturally select for the current climate. So, considering the climate of the future is important when choosing what to plant today.
The research station where Battaglia works sits along the base of the Rocky Mountain foothills, a semi-arid climate home to Ponderosa pine and Colorado blue spruce. While not very far away from one another, a Ponderosa near his station will be adapted to different conditions than another tree of the same species growing only 20 miles away up in the mountains. Foresters like Battaglia and Nigro use climate models to foresee the likely future conditions of a location. The models predict factors such as temperature, humidity, and frequency of natural disasters. They then match the location with the seeds of trees—sometimes even within the same species—currently adapted to those climatic conditions in other places.
There are many different factors to consider besides temperature, though. Reduced snowpack in the mountains will mean drier summers and longer growing seasons; more frequent fires will mean that silviculturalists need to consider fuel loads on the forest floor and the ability of trees to regenerate after fire. The goal is to help the ecosystem withstand such disturbances while still meeting the desired outcome for that forest, such as reforestation, climate adaptation, or even logging.
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Who am I without my obsession for abandoned places and eerie forests and the paranormal😔🙏🏻
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💧 Tropical forests generate rainfall worth billions, study finds
Tropical forests generate rainfall worth billions, study finds
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Hey, Portland-area folks! Want to go on a guided hike with me and learn about forest ecology? Tualitin Hills Park and Recreation District has invited me to show people some of the natural wonders at Cooper Mountain! More details at https://www.thprd.org/activities/search-classes-and-camps - sort by Winter 2026 and Nature Activities, then scroll down to Forest Ecology in the results.
