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Harvard Forest REU Symposium Abstract 2005
- Title: Aboveground Carbon Storage in a Deciduous Forest 48 Years After Fire
- Author: Susan Cheng (Columbia University in the City of New York)
- Abstract:
Many temperate forests in the Northern Hemisphere are thought to be carbon sinks which slow the rate of increase in atmospheric CO2. Forests store carbon belowground in organic ground matter and soil, or aboveground in wood. In order to estimate carbon storage in forest ecosystems, it is important to understand how a forest’s carbon balance varies with age and fire history. I measured aboveground carbon storage in a primarily deciduous forest dominated by red oak (Quercus rubra) and red maple (Acer rubrum) and affected by a 1957 fire on Little Prospect Hill at Harvard Forest in central Massachusetts, USA. Annual radial growth was measured in trees with diameters greater than 10 cm in 24 plots at 100, 200, and 300 m southwest or northwest of an eddy covariance tower. I used standard allometric equations from forestry literature to calculate carbon storage in each plot, and in areas inside and outside the burn area. These results showed that a post-fire forest less than 50 years old stored aboveground carbon at a similar rate (about 1.5 Mg C/ha/yr) to a nearby 65 to 100 year old forest in recent years. A large decrease in carbon storage at the forest on Little Prospect Hill was most likely due to a gypsy moth invasion from 1979-1981. Aboveground carbon storage recovered to its 1977 level (about 1.3 Mg C/ha/yr) less than 10 years after the gypsy moth outbreak.
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