but there are ways to ensure that the genes do not spread to the forest. These techniques include growing crops away from native stands
In the future genetically modified trees could be planted like an agricultural crop not in our native forests.
A research ship moves about the speed of a 10-speed bicycle said Scott Doney director of the Ocean and Climate Change Institute at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Woods Hole Mass.
On land Earth's great forests might be understood the least areas. In northern Siberia a region with no permanent settlements and few roads there are only six year-round monitoring sites across seven time zones.
Forests remove carbon from the air during photosynthesis and store it in wood and roots making these forests
what scientists call carbon sinks. But droughts and wildfires can turn forests into carbon sources releasing the stored carbon back into the atmosphere.
We don't know when and how often forests cross the line from sink to source.
OCO-2 will not be the first satellite to measure carbon dioxide but it's the first with the observational strategy precision resolution
and US Forest Service in the Ecological Society of America's journal Ecosphere last week but outlier project sites with good grouse habitat may yield clues to successful management scenarios.
The sagebrush ecosystem is adapted not to frequent fires like some forests in California and the central Rockies and fires have increased in frequency and in size over the last half century.
and it's not very good at dispersing seeds long distance said author Robert Arkle a supervisory ecologist for the USGS Forest & Rangeland Ecosystem Science Center at the Snake river Field Station in Idaho.
Scientists from Virginia Tech the Woods Hole Research center and the University of California Santa barbara funded by NASA are collaborating with Brazilian scientists to explore the ecosystem consequences of the extreme droughts of 2005 and 2010 and the extreme flood
and forest productivity in the floodplains and how extreme events such as floods and droughts may disturb this cycle.
and droughts said Michael Coe a senior scientist at the Woods Hole Research center. It is important that we understand how the Amazon river
Two other Amazon resources--fisheries and forests--are important to the livelihood of the people of the region.
and productivity of floodplain forests--those enriched by rising waters called whitewater river forests and nutrient-poor blackwater river forests.
and fire-induced tree mortality to measure the response of floodplain forests to inter-annual flood variability
and extreme climate events said Marcia Macedo a research associate at the Woods Hole Research center.
Previous research has focused on Amazon upland forests and the potential impacts of deforestation fire and drought.
and that it was such an overriding factor said Thomas Crowther a postdoctoral fellow at the Yale School of Forestry
This capacity might buffer soil microbes against the disturbance of forest removal they said. In contrast sandy soils have larger particles with less surface area retaining fewer nutrients and less organic matter.
But in clay-like soil you can cut down the forest and the nutrients remain trapped tightly in the muddy clay.
In a clay soil you cut down the forest and the nutrients are retained for long periods of time
Whereas in a sandy soil you cut down a forest and the community changes dramatically within only a couple of years.
The above story is provided based on materials by Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies. The original article was written by Kevin Dennehy.
#Using more wood for construction can slash global reliance on fossil fuelsa Yale university-led study has found that using more wood
Despite an established forest conservation theory holding that tree harvesting should be minimized strictly to prevent the loss of biodiversity
The results were published March 28 in the Journal of Sustainable Forestry. In the comprehensive study scientists from the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies (F&es) and the University of Washington's College of the Environment evaluated a range of scenarios including leaving forests untouched burning wood for energy
and using various solid wood products for construction. The researchers calculated that the amount of wood harvested globally each year (3. 4 billion cubic meters) is equivalent to only about 20 percent of annual wood growth (17 billion cubic meters)
and much of that harvest is burned inefficiently for cooking. They found that increasing the wood harvest to the equivalent of 34
%or more of annual wood growth would have profound and positive effects: â#¢Between 14%and 31%of global CO2 emissions could be avoided by preventing emissions related to steel and concrete;
by storing CO2 in the cellulose and lignin of wood products; and other factors. â#¢About 12%to 19%of annual global fossil fuel consumption would be saved including savings achieved
because scrap wood and unsellable materials could be burned for energy replacing fossil fuel consumption. Wood-based construction consumes much less energy than concrete or steel construction.
Through efficient harvesting and product use more CO2 is saved through the avoided emissions materials and wood energy than is lost from the harvested forest.
This study shows still another reason to appreciate forests --and another reason to not let them be cleared permanently for agriculture said Chadwick Oliver the Pinchot Professor of Forestry
and Environmental Studies director of the Global Institute of Sustainable Forestry at F&es and lead author of the new study.
Forest harvest creates a temporary opening that is needed by forest species such as butterflies and some birds and deer before it regrows to large trees.
But conversion to agriculture is a permanent loss of all forest biodiversity. The manufacture of steel concrete and brick accounts for about 16 percent of global fossil fuel consumption.
When the transport and assembly of steel concrete and brick products is considered its share of fossil fuel burning is closer to 20%to 30%Oliver said.
Reductions in fossil fuel consumption and carbon emissions from construction will become increasingly critical as demand for new buildings bridges
and South america according to a previous F&es study And innovative construction techniques are now making wood even more effective in bridges and mid-rise apartment buildings.
And maintaining a mix of forest habitats and densities in non-reserved forests--in addition to keeping some global forests in reserves--would help preserve biodiversity in ecosystems worldwide Oliver said.
About 12.5%of the world's forests are located currently in reserves. Forests historically have had a diversity of habitats that different species need Oliver said.
This diversity can be maintained by harvesting some of the forest growth. And the harvested wood will save fossil fuel
and CO2 and provide jobs--giving local people more reason to keep the forests. Story Source The above story is provided based on materials by Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies.
The original article was written by Kevin Dennehy. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. Journal Reference R
#Fast food giants ads for healthier kids meals dont send the right messagefast food giants attempts at depicting healthier kids'meals frequently goes unnoticed by children ages 3 to 7
years old according to a new study by Dartmouth-Hitchcock Norris Cotton Cancer Center. In research published on March 31 2014 in JAMA Pediatrics Dartmouth researchers found that one-half to one-third of children did not identify milk
when shown Mcdonald's and Burger king children's advertising images depicting that product. Sliced apples in Burger king's ads were identified as apples by only 10 percent of young viewers;
's Benjamin M. and Mary Greenwood Anderson Professor in Mechanical engineering and Materials Science and of chemistry.
'mosaic'vegetation (grassland shrubland forest and cropland; broad-leaved deciduous forest; needle-leaved evergreen forest; needle-leaved deciduous and evergreen forest;
mixed broad-leaved and needle-leaved forest; and mixed-forest shrubland and grassland. They analyzed data across all the groups recognizing that forests
which have not changed size due to human intervention for example through forestry or farming provide the most reliable information on vegetation response to changes in our climate.
The most pronounced change found by the researchers was in the broad-leaved deciduous and needleleaved deciduous forest groups showing that Autumn is becoming significantly later.
This delay in the signs of Autumn was pronounced generally more than any evidence for an earlier onset of Spring
although there is evidence across the groups that Spring is arriving slightly earlier. Professor Peter Atkinson comments:
Previous studies have reported trends in the start of Spring and end of Autumn but we have studied a longer time period
and controlled for forest loss and vegetation type making our study more rigorous and with a greater degree of accuracy.
Our research shows that even when we control for land cover changes across the globe a changing climate is significantly altering the vegetation growth cycles for certain types of vegetation.
Such changes may have consequences for the sustainability of the plants themselves as well as species which depend on them and ultimately the climate through changes to the carbon cycle.
Besides charismatic species such as the orangutans that the students encounter every day in the forest the tropical ecosystem consists of scores of unseen organisms
These one-millimetre-long spiders build tiny webs that they suspend between dead leaves on the forest floor.
#Agroforestry systems can repair degraded watershedsagroforestry combined with land and water management practices that increase agricultural productivity can save watersheds from degradation.
A study conducted by the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) in the Gabayan watershed in eastern Bohol Philippines has shown that agroforestry systems create a more sustainably managed watershed that allows people living there to benefit from the ecosystem.
Agroforestry is integrated an land-use management technique that incorporates trees and shrubs with crops and livestock on farms.
The study called Modeling the effects of adopting agroforestry on basin scale surface runoff and sediment yield in the Philippines uses a computer-based Soil
SWAT was used to simulate the impacts of current land-use practices and conservation agriculture with agroforestry in strategic locations.
%and sediment concentration (35%)in the Gabayan watershed under agroforestry and conservation agriculture. The study was
therefore able to provide scientific evidence that agroforestry combined with improved land management practices are an effective land-use strategy for the watersheds.
The above story is provided based on materials by World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length h
#Bioenergy from sustainable forestry does not meet EU emission reduction criteriathe levels of forest residue bioenergy considered to be sustainable from a forestry perspective may provide considerable reductions in greenhouse gas emissions in European countries.
A new study estimated emission reductions achievable in European countries by producing bioenergy from forest harvest residues in amounts that have been considered to be sustainable from a forestry perspective earlier.
These forestry sustainability criteria included several environmental technical and social aspects. According to the study forest residue bioenergy must be used for 60 to 80 years before the emission savings reach the required 60%level in most European countries.
This lag follows from the effect of the harvest residue removals on the carbon balance of forests especially soil (indirect land-use-related emissions.
Nevertheless the residues provide substantial emission reductions already sooner. By 2035 the emissions are reduced by 25 to 55
and reduce the interest in developing genuine low-emission climate-friendly practices of bioenergy production from forest residues.
#Forests crucial to green growththe value of forests and tree-based ecosystems extends far beyond carbon sequestration;
A new report launched in Jakarta Indonesia on 21 march--the International Day of Forests--promotes REDD+and the Green Economy as together providing a new pathway to sustainable development that can benefit all nations.
and even boost the economic and social benefits forests provide to human society. Building Natural Capital--How REDD+Can Support a Green Economy was developed by the International Resources Panel.
while maintaining or increasing forest cover. According to the report REDD+needs to be placed in a landscape-scale planning framework that goes beyond forests to consider all sectors of a modern economy
and the needs of agriculture energy water resources finance transport industry trade and cities. In this way REDD+would add value to other initiatives such as agroforestry projects that are being implemented within these sectors
and be a critical element in a green economy. The report provides recommendations on how to integrate REDD
+and Green Economy approaches such as through better coordination stronger private sector engagement changes in fiscal incentive frameworks greater focus on assisting policymakers to understand the role forests play in propping up economies
and forestry outputs to meet future needs while at the same time enhancing the conservation of forests and ecosystem services.
Each year the International Day of Forests highlights the unique role of forests in the environment
and in sustaining livelihoods. The theme this year is Celebrating Forests for Sustainable Development. It is important day to remind us to save our planet as it is the only one we know which has trees says Tony Simons the Director General of the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF.
Trees are made what Earth habitable for mammals and destruction of forests will lead to the ultimate destruction of mammals--including humans.
Trees are one of the few things which live longer than humans--a true intergenerational gift.
He added. Forests and trees are key to sustainable development. Not only do they store carbon they support biodiversity regulate water flows
and reduce soil erosion. Nearly 1. 6 billion people worldwide depend on forests as a source of food medicines timber and fuel.
Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length h
#UV exposure found to lower folate levels in young womenwomen who are pregnant or trying to fall pregnant and taking a folic acid supplement may be at risk of reducing their folate benefit through sun exposure a new QUT study has warned.
#Excessive deer populations hurt native plant biodiversitytoo much garlic mustard growing in the forests of Pennsylvania?
Instead it became a menace colonizing forest floors in the Eastern U s . and Canada and has been found in Washington Utah
and British columbia achieving the dubious distinction of being one of very few nonnative plants to successfully invade forest understories.
The persistence of garlic mustard greatly reduces forest biodiversity. To study the effect of rampant deer on trillium
and garlic mustard populations the researchers established multiple 196-square-meter plots in the forest. Half were fenced to exclude deer.
When people walk in the woods where deer are overabundant they don't realize what's missing Kalisz says.
Yet deer exact a toll not only on forest species but also farms orchards and even your car and your car insurance rate Kalisz says.
#Ants plant tomorrows rainforesttropical montane rain forests are threatened highly and their remnants are surrounded often by deforested landscapes.
For the regeneration of these degraded areas seed dispersal of forest trees plays a crucial role
and Climate Research Centre and the University of Halle-Wittenberg demonstrates the importance of this hitherto neglected ecosystem function for the restoration of montane rain forests.
Ants promote the regeneration of these forests by dispersing seeds to safe sites for tree establishment.
The Yungas a region on the eastern slopes of the Bolivian Andes near La Paz are marked by elongated valleys with relicts of the original mountain rain forest.
and the extension of coca plantations the forests are fragmented highly. The forest relicts are surrounded by an open largely degraded cultural landscape.
In this context the team conducted experiments to find out to what extent ants contribute to the dispersal of a widespread primarily bird-dispersed tree (Clusia trochiformis)
but very little is known about its impact in degraded forest ecosystems. The study reveals that ants reduce seed predation by rodents and increase germination success
--which confirms the importance of this ecosystem function for forest regeneration. The study has been carried out in two 3000 ha islands of natural mountain rain forest
which are surrounded by coca fields and degraded fallows covered with fern and shrub vegetation. The microclimate in the deforested areas is characterized by harsh abiotic conditions that limit seed germination
and recruitment and hence inhibit the re-establishment of forest trees. The researchers deposited 1440 Clusia seeds in 72 depots at six sites.
forest interior degraded habitat close to the forest and degraded habitat far from the forest edge.
and plant species and accelerate the regeneration of the mountain rain forest ecosystem. Schleuning concludes: Drought frequencies in the Andes are likely to increase in the future.
Under this scenario the dispersal function of ants may further increase in importance for the restoration of tropical mountain forests.
Loblolly pine plays an important role in American forestry. Now that we've unlocked its genetic secrets loblolly pine will take on even greater importance as we look for new sources of biomass to drive our nation's bioeconomy
He and frequent collaborator Anders Møller of Universitã Paris-Sud noticed something unusual in the course of their work in the Red Forest the most contaminated part of the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone.
They also measured the thickness of the forest floor in the same areas where samples were placed.
#Forest corridors help plants disperse their seeds, study showsa forest in South carolina a supercomputer in Ohio and some glow-in-the-dark yarn have helped a team of field ecologists conclude that woodland corridors connecting patches of endangered plants not only increase dispersal of seeds
from one patch to another but also create wind conditions that can spread the seeds for much longer distances.
Therefore to comprehend the fine details of the relationships between the forest gap structures and the wind the scientists leveraged the physical model to generate a virtual and complete environment where every detail of the wind
and seeds movement and the forest structure are known. Bohrer ran the dataset through a high-resolution atmospheric model that he had developed on OSC's IBM Opteron 1350 Glenn Cluster.
and seeds that disperse with it through a forest Bohrer said. The model resolves the wind flow
(or air mixed with forest leaves) of about 10 cubic meters. It also represented millions of dispersing virtual seeds.
Teresa Saura and Ramon Vallejo from the Department of Plant Biology of UB and Santiago Sabatã from the Department of Ecology of UB and the Centre for Ecological Research and Forestry Applications (CREAF.
They belong to several institutions such as the Autonomous University of Barcelona the University of Girona the Centre for Ecological Research and Forestry Applications (CREAF) the Forest Sciences Centre of Catalonia (CTFC) the Natural history Museum
To compare this with Amazon carbon absorption the researchers used censuses of forest growth and different modeling scenarios that accounted for uncertainties.
In every scenario carbon absorption by living trees outweighed emissions from the dead ones indicating that the prevailing effect in natural forests of the Amazon is absorption.
Until now scientists had only been able to estimate the Amazon's carbon balance from limited observations in small forest areas called plots.
On these plots the forest removes more carbon than it emits but the scientific community has been vigorously debating how well the plots represent all the natural processes in the huge Amazon region.
That debate began with the discovery in the 1990s that large areas of the forest can be killed off by intense storms in events called blowdowns.
and only Espã rito-Santo's dedication made it possible said Michael Keller a research scientist at the U s. Forest Service
For example fallen trees create a gap in the forest canopy that can be measured by lidar on research aircraft
and dead wood changes the colors in a satellite optical image. The researchers then scaled up their techniques so they could be applied to satellite and airborne data for parts of the Amazon with no corresponding ground data.
U s. Forest Service International Institute of Tropical Forestry Puerto rico; EMBRAPA Satellite Monitoring Center Campinas Brazil;
The new species of bark mantises were discovered in tropical forests and also found among existing museum collections.
and play dead after fluttering down to the forest floor since none of the species are strong fliers.
Murphy is now exploring climate vulnerability in Ohio's Appalachia near the Wayne National Forest in southeast Ohio where he says future flooding could pose a threat.
Funding for the project was supported by the U s. Forest Service at the Rocky mountain Research Station.
and Daniel Williams research social scientist USDA Forest Service Rocky mountain Research Station. Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by University of Cincinnati.
Our work brings the lab into the forest and it can help us answer questions about how these animals are doing
Winners and losers in the forestch2014-Impacts shows differentiated developments for forests: in low locations in inneralpine valleys that are already very dry today--such as Saastal in Wallis for example--the forest reacts very sensitively.
Just a small additional increase in heat has consequences. The tree population is threatened by weaker growth
In many cases the forests will not show serious changes until towards the end of this century. But according to the researchers forest tending already has to be adjusted now to the more long-term developments to be expected.
and the dryness would be a problem for the forests. According to another result of the report the sensitive south of Switzerland has to expect striking effects of climate change
But climate change is also presenting forestry with new challenges. The changing conditions necessitate an adaptation of forest tending and the promotion of biodiversity.
Adaptive measures and improved management are not enough however for coping with climate change. A reduction of greenhouse gas emissions still remains an urgent priority.
which quickly flew into the forest and 34 newly hatched olive ridley sea turtles which crawled into the sea.
Greater area than tropical rain foreststropical grassy areas cover a greater area than tropical rain forests support about one fifth of the world's population
and its Reducing Emissions and Deforestation Forest Degradation schemes need to be considered better when they are applied to tropical grasslands.
I describe these findings as Mapquest for plant scientists says Vincent Chiang co-director of NC State's Forest Biotechnology Group the lead team for the project which involved scientists in the College of Natural resources College of Engineering
and composition of lignin as well as why it's often difficult to modify lignin in plants says Ronald Sederoff co-director of Forest Biotechnology Group.
These patches edged by forest are slowly being taken over by shrubs. A recent University of Illinois study examined the soil microbes on nine patches also called balds that had varying degrees of shrub invasion
and as the degree of shrub encroachment increased that shrub fungi joined the forest group to become one big woody community.
Yannarell said that forest and prairie microbial communities are always very different from each other even in this case where they are only a couple of meters apart.
The microbes in the shrub soil tend to be different but different parts of the microbial community change in relationship to the shrub to the forest to the prairie.
The shrub bacteria are more like what they found in open prairie than in the forest.
But the shrub fungi looked a lot more like the forest fungi. We think what we found is the signature of these early changes these early shifts of microbial communities toward a woody fungal community Yannarell said.
The hill prairies are shrinking as the forest and now native shrubs such as dogwood sumac shrubby black locust and eventually red cedar move in.
This has important implications for forest regeneration in the tropics. Bats play a key role in pollinating plants
Natural succession of forests could therefore suffer as tropical habitats become increasingly illuminated. The impact of light pollution could be reduced by changes in lighting design
and to manoeuvre elegantly within the dense forest. This is necessary since they mainly feed on fruit of pepper plants from the Genus piper that grow in the understory.
One piece of wood they found had rings going back to about 650 B c. These yearly rings change with temperature
#Predation on invertebrates by woodland salamanders increases carbon capturewoodland salamanders perform a vital ecological service in American forests by helping to mitigate the impacts of global warming.
Woodland salamanders facilitate the capture of this carbon before it is released by feeding on invertebrates (beetles earthworms snails ants etc.
and other forest debris. Woodland salamanders are the most common vertebrate species in American forests;
consequently these small seldom-seen animals may play a significant role in regulating the capture of carbon from leaf litter in forest soils.
Dr. Hartwell Welsh Jr. research wildlife biologist at the U s. Forest Service's Pacific Southwest Research Station (PSW) helped conduct a study in Northwestern Calif. that examined how woodland salamander
The study included soil moisture as a covariate and field enclosures on the forest floor to quantify the effects of woodland salamanders.
and found that woodland salamander predation on invertebrates suppressed some populations of invertebrates and released others with the overall result of increased litter retention and carbon capture in the soil.
and raise awareness of the ecological role woodland salamanders play in the forest carbon cycle. The renowned evolutionary biologist E. O. Wilson once said it is the little things that run the world Dr. Welsh said.
and their influence on the forest carbon cycle is a good example of what he was talking about.
The above story is provided based on materials by USDA Forest Service-Pacific Southwest Research Station. Note:
Overtext Web Module V3.0 Alpha
Copyright Semantic-Knowledge, 1994-2011