What's Making Canada Dry?
01 February 2012 05:42 PM Filed in: forest management | global warming
Researchers looking into the effects of drought in northern forest regions of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba have discovered that the increasing lack of precipitation in recent decades appears to be having a significant and profound effect.
A team of biologists from the University of Montreal, led by Dr. Changhui Peng, studied tree mortality and found significant increases of almost 5% per year over a 45-year period. Forests in western Canada were suffering significantly more than those in the East.
Warmer temperatures and a reduction in rainfall have combined to threaten the boreal forests through the damaging effects caused by such consequential elements as increasing beetle infestations and the growing frequency and ferocity of forest fires. But during the research carried out by Dr. Peng and his colleagues they only studied trees in areas that were unaffected by fires, logging or invasive pests. They discovered that the trees in the West were growing more slowly than in the past, and dying younger.
This is particularly worrying when considering the boreal forests’ essential role as a vital carbon sink in a world with an ever-changing climate. Long acknowledged for the forests’ importance as removers of large quantities of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, the balance has shifted so that the volume of dying and decaying trees are producing more CO2 than the healthy trees are absorbing.
A real concern is that if these, and other, forests continue to decline it will have a significant impact on the long-term sustainability of logging and general forest management. In the short-term as trees die off and incendiary shrubbery proliferates, the need for increased fire weather monitoring and fire management will surely be of paramount importance if Canada’s forests and those around the world are to be saved.
This is particularly worrying when considering the boreal forests’ essential role as a vital carbon sink in a world with an ever-changing climate. Long acknowledged for the forests’ importance as removers of large quantities of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, the balance has shifted so that the volume of dying and decaying trees are producing more CO2 than the healthy trees are absorbing.
A real concern is that if these, and other, forests continue to decline it will have a significant impact on the long-term sustainability of logging and general forest management. In the short-term as trees die off and incendiary shrubbery proliferates, the need for increased fire weather monitoring and fire management will surely be of paramount importance if Canada’s forests and those around the world are to be saved.
Source: CTV News
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