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Harvard Forest Research Project 2024
- Title: Mapped Overstory Plots at TSI
- Principal investigator: Audrey Barker Plotkin (aabarker@fas.harvard.edu)
- Institution: Harvard Forest
- Primary contact: Audrey Barker Plotkin (aabarker@fas.harvard.edu)
- Team members: Greta VanScoy
- Abstract:
These plots were established and mapped in 1990 for an experiment designed to study the effects of selective overstory tree mortality. The planned manipulation was to kill and leave standing one species in each of four plots, to simulate mortality by a species-specific pathogen. This manipulation was never done, for logistical reasons and because the appearance of the hemlock woolly adelgid provided a more pressing "natural" experiment to study; however, the plots are maintained and have been used in other studies. There are four 50m x 50m plots, located in a mixed hardwood forest (red oak and maple species are major components), north of the experimental hurricane site. Tree data from the control plot of the experimental hurricane study could be added to this set for some analyses, since all the plots are in the same general area and forest type, and similar types of measurements were made on all of these trees. Tree diameter and condition were re-surveyed in these plots in Autumn 2003 and 2013, and saplings growing into the "tree" size class of greater than or equal to 5cm diameter were measured, tagged and mapped.
Methods:
Each 50m x 50m plot was established with a 10m x 10m grid and all trees of diameter greater than or equal to 5 cm dbh were mapped using a least-squares technique in which inter-tree distances were measured to the nearest centimeter (Boose et al. 1998. Ecology 79:819-827). For each tree, species, canopy position, health, and diameter were recorded. Trees with multiple stems originating from a single base were measured as separate individuals if the stems forked at less than 1.3m high.
