Tree Species Site Suitability as a Combination of Occurrence Probability and Growth and Derivation of Priority Regions for Climate Change Adaptation

Abstract

Two aspects of site suitability were combined, namely species occurrence probability and tree growth as proxies for risk and productivity, aiming to improve climate impact assessments for forests. This measure was used to identify priority regions for climate change adaptation under consideration of current stands. The six most frequent tree species according to German national forest inventory data were used considering repeated measurements. Species distribution and growth models were calculated and combined into one measure. To identify priority regions regarding current forests, we aggregated species-specific negative development of site suitability for stands where a tree species actually occurred. Suitability under climate change increased or remained unchanged for current stands of silver fir, pedunculate oak and sessile oak. European beech and Scots pine showed large area shares with negative changes, but also areas with positive changes in site suitability. For Norway spruce, suitability decreased strongly. Priority regions were concentrated in the federal states Rhineland-Palatinate, Hesse, Baden-Württemberg, Thuringia, Lower Saxony, and Saxony-Anhalt. Certainly, the workflow contained several steps, at which decisions had to be made. Although this work did not resolve all issues of site suitability modeling for climate impact on forests, it provided a more comprehensive view on tree species site suitability in biogeographical modeling.

Potential Impact of Climate Change on the Forest Coverage and the Spatial Distribution of 19 Key Forest Tree Species in Italy under RCP4.5 IPCC Trajectory for 2050s

“…With attention to conifer species such as European larch and Norway spruce, a reduction of habitat suitability is a possible event. A negative variation in habitat suitability of Norway spruce represents a focal point for the high economic value of timber and it reported by different previous works [92,107]. A negative variation in habitat suitability for European larch is also confirmed by Dyderski et al [102] and Mamet et al [108].…”

Potential impact of climate change on the spatial distribution of key forest tree species in Italy under RCP4.5 for 2050s

“…With attention to conifers species such as European larch and Norway spruce a reduction of habitat suitability is possible event. A negative variation in habitat suitability of Norway spruce represent a focal point in particular for the high economic value of timber and it reported by different previous works (Hanewinkel et al 2012;Märkel and Dolos 2017;Dyderski et al 2018). A negative variation in habitat suitability for European larch is also con rmed by Dyderski et al (2018) and Mamet et al (2019).…”

The Potential for Future Shifts in Tree Species Distribution Provided by Dispersal and Ecological Niches: A Comparison between Beech and Oak in Europe

“…Previous studies reveal that oak can occur beyond our covered data range of 633 mm, even with annual precipitation of 450 or 461 mm [74,92]. Märkel and Doloss [111] also showed the highest probability of occurrence at warm temperatures and low-to-medium annual precipitation. Furthermore, dendroecological studies have found a high drought tolerance for oak compared to beech [93,[112][113][114][115].…”