Analysis of Ice Storm Impact on and Post-Disaster Recovery of Typical Subtropical Forests in Southeast China

Abstract

Ice storms greatly affect the structure, dynamics, and functioning of forest ecosystems. Studies on the impact of such disasters, as well as the post-disaster recovery of forests, are important contents in forest biology, ecology, and geography. Remote-sensing technology provides data and methods that can support the study of disasters at the large-to-medium scale and over long time periods. This study took Chebaling National Nature Reserve in Guangdong Province, China, as the study area. First, field-survey data and remote-sensing data were comprehensively analyzed to demonstrate the feasibility of replacing the forest stock volume with the mean annual value of the Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI), to study forest growth and change. We then used the EVI from 2007 to 2017, together with a variety of other remote-sensing and forest sub-compartment data, to analyze the impact of the 2008 ice storm and the subsequent post-disaster recovery of the forest. Finally, we drew the following conclusions: (1) Topography had a considerable effect on disaster impact and forest recovery in Chebaling. The forest at high altitudes (700–1000 m) and on steep slopes (25–40°) was seriously affected by this disaster but had a stronger post-disaster recovery ability. Meanwhile, the hardest-hit area for coniferous forest was higher and steeper than that for broad-leaved forest. (2) In the same terrain conditions, coniferous forests were less affected by the disaster than broad-leaved forests and showed less variation during the post-disaster recovery process. Nevertheless, broad-leaved forests had faster recovery rates and higher recovery degrees; (3) Under the influence of human activities, the recovery and fluctuation degree for planted forest in the post-disaster recovery process was significantly higher than that for natural forest. The study suggests that forest has high disaster resistance and self-recovery ability after the ice storm, and this ability has a strong correlation with the type of forest and the topographic factors such as elevation and slope. At the same time, human intervention can speed up the recovery of forests after disasters.

Altered albedo dominates the radiative forcing changes in a subtropical forest following an extreme snow event

“…This caused a drastic decrease in LAI in 2015 (Figure 4a). In line with previous studies (Barr et al, 2012;Wang et al, 2014;Yao et al, 2020;Zhao et al, 2020), the LAI of the forest returned to normal within 5 years after the event, which shows that forests are resilient and recover quickly after disturbance (Figure 4a). Our results reveal that the LAI decrease caused a decline in ecosystem GPP (Table 2; Figure 6a), and the impact of snow disturbance on leaf biomass persisted through the initial leaf-out period in 2015 and led to a 41% decrease in GPP values.…”

“…Therefore, the impacts of extreme snowfall events in subtropical forests need to be understood. The effects of snow damage include not only physiological stress due to freezing but also physical damages to the vegetation that could last for years (Teich et al, 2019; Yao et al, 2020). This vegetation damage can seriously compromise ecosystem production and thus cause positive feedback to climate change (Nykänen et al, 1997; Zhang et al, 2012; Zhao et al, 2020).…”

Both Soil Bacteria and Soil Chemical Property Affected the Micropredator Myxobacterial Community: Evidence from Natural Forest Soil and Greenhouse Rhizosphere Soil

“…The sampling sites of CB located at the mountain areas along the Shixing and Quannan county, which is tectonically a part of the fold system in South China with light metamorphic sand shale and acid volcanic rock. The soil type is typical red soil [ 28 ]. DL has a tropical monsoon climate with a mean monthly temperature range from 15 °C in January to 28 °C in July.…”

Does the Policy of Ecological Forest Rangers (EFRs) for the Impoverished Populations Reduce Forest Disasters?—Empirical Evidence from China

“…Under the background of essentially completing urgent poverty reduction tasks in the past and alleviating the pressure of local poverty alleviation, the orientation of the EFR policy objectives should shift from the "poverty reduction" goal focused on the past to the dual goal of "poverty reduction and ecological protection"; next, regarding "ecological management and protection", the appraisal index corresponding to the target is included in the content of the performance appraisal. Human intervention can accelerate the restoration of forests following disasters [34,35]. Therefore, on the one hand, it is necessary to quantify the local government's "forest disaster" incidence indicators during the EFR policy implementation.…”