Tropical storms, fire, and urbanization have produced a heavily fragmented forested landscape along Florida's Gulf coast. The longleaf pine forest, one of the most threatened ecosystems in the US, makes up a major part of this fragmented landscape. These three disturbance regimes have produced a mosaic of differently-aged pine patches of single or two cohort structures along this coastline. The major focus of our study was to determine reference ecosystem conditions by assessing the soil biochemical properties, overstory stand structure, and understory plant species richness along a patch-derived 110-year chronosequence in order to accurately evaluate on-going longleaf pine restoration projects. This ecological dataset was also used to classify each reference patch as mesic flatwoods, wet flatwoods, or wet savanna. All of the reference locations were found to have similar soil types with no significant differences in their soil biogeochemistry. Mean diameter-at-breast height (DBH), tree height, and patch basal area increased as mean patch age increased. Stand growth reached a plateau around 80 -90 years. Shrub cover was significantly higher in the matureaged patches (86 -110 years) than in the young (6 -10 years) or mid-aged (17 -52 years) patches, despite prescribed fire. Plant species diversity as indicated by the Shannon-Wiener index decreased with patch age. Soil biogeochemical properties, forest structure, and understory species composition were effective for ecologically classifying our pine patches as 55% mesic flatwoods, 20% wet flatwoods, and 25% wet savanna. Florida's Gulf coastal wet longleaf pine flatwoods attain a structural and plant species equilibrium between 80 -90 years.
The second full, annualized inventory of Maine's forests was completed in 2008 after more than 3,160 forested plots were measured. Forest land occupies almost 17.7 million acres that represents 82 percent of the total land area of Maine. The dominant forest-type groups are maple/beech/yellow birch, spruce/fi r, white/red/jack pine, and aspen/white birch. Total statewide volume equals 25.5 billion ft 3 , resulting in almost 590 million ft 3 of live tree volume grown each year. The report also contains additional information on sustainability, biomass, carbon, forest health, land use change, and timber products. DVD included in this report includes detailed information on forest inventory methods and the quality of the estimates found in fi ve detailed tables (Tables A-E). A complete set of core tables are contained on the DVD or can be found online: http://www.nrs.fs.fed.us/fi a/data-tools/state-reports/default.asp.
The second full annual inventory of Pennsylvania's forests reports a stable base of 16.7 million acres of forest land. Northern hardwoods and mixed-oak forest-type groups account for 54 and 32 percent of the forest land, respectively. The State's forest land averages about 61 dry tons of wood per acre and almost 6,500 board feet (International ¼-inch rule) per acre on timberland. The ratio of average annual net growth-to-removals for growing-stock trees on timberland was about 2:1. Additional information is presented on forest land use, forest resources, forest sustainability, forest health (including regeneration), and timber products. Detailed information on forest inventory methods and data quality estimates are included in a DVD at the back of the report. Tables of population estimates and a glossary are also included. Printed on recycled paper The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) prohibits discrimination in all its programs and activities on the basis of race, color, national origin, gender, religion, age, disability, political beliefs, sexual orientation, and marital or family status. (Not all prohibited bases apply to all programs.) Persons with disabilities who require alternative means for communication of program information (Braille, large print, audiotape, etc.) should contact USDA's TARGET Center at (202) 720-2600 (voice and TDD). To file a complaint of discrimination, write USDA,
Assessing the status of soil nutrients with their corresponding microbial communities provides important information about degraded soils during the restoration of coastal wet pine forests. Net nitrogen mineralization, nitrogen-oxidizing bacteria (NOB), and soil microbial biomass were compared with patch-derived volume along a 110-year longleaf pine (Pinus palustris Mill.) chronosequence for identifying a trajectory and ecological benchmark during forest restoration. Net nitrogen mineralization rates decreased significantly in the maturing-aged, pine patches, driven by a larger drop in net nitrification. Net nitrification and abundance of NOB were higher in young pine patches compared to soils from the maturing (86-110 years) pine patches. Gross nitrate fluxes followed the nonfungal portion of the soil microbial biomass along the chronosequence, declining in 64-year-old pine patches. Microbial biomass peaked in patches 17-34 years of age, but significantly declined in the older patches. Fungal biomass leveled off without decline. Ammonium was the major source of nitrogen within the maturing pine patches as well as the wetland patches, indicating that ammonium maintains longleaf pine during growth-limiting conditions. Nitrate dominated during rapid tree growth, optimally in mesic conditions. The relative amounts of available ammonium to nitrate can be used to model nitrogen cycling in facultative-wetland pine forests of the coastal United States as soils alternate between wet and mesic conditions. A key restoration benchmark occurred after 86 years of pine development when pine patch growth rates slowed, with lower numbers of NOB, when the nonfungal biomass leveled off, and net nitrification rates are at a minimum, during pine maturation.
Ozone is a highly toxic air contaminant that has been shown to decrease tree growth and cause signifi cant disturbance to forested ecosystems. Ozone also causes distinct foliar injury symptoms to certain species (bioindicator plants) that can be used to detect and monitor ozone stress (biomonitoring) in the forest environment. In the early 1990s, the U.S. Forest Service, in partnership with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, developed and implemented a suite of forest health indicators to respond to emerging demands for a comprehensive assessment of the health of U.S. forests. This report focuses on the states in the Northern Research Station-Forest Inventory and Analysis region, which has the longest record of ozone biomonitoring in the country, from 1994 through 2010. The results of 17 years of ozone injury detection provide indisputable evidence that ozone-induced foliar injury symptoms occur routinely on ozone-sensitive bioindicator plants across much of the forested landscape and in areas previously thought to be relatively ozone free. This report provides state-level information on where ozone stress occurs and whether ozone stress is increasing or decreasing over time. It also provides state-level estimates of the acres of forest land and volume of ozone-susceptible species at risk of ozone impact.
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