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Harvard Forest Research Project 2024
- Title: Prospect Hill Forest Plots
- 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:
The three main tracts of the Harvard Forest have been sampled periodically since 1907. The timing and methods used in the 1937 inventory make it a particularly valuable data set. The inventory covers the range of forest types and the three main tracts of the Harvard Forest land base. This inventory was conducted one year before 75% of the standing timber at Harvard Forest was blown down by the Great New England hurricane of 1938, so these measurements show maximum vegetation development since agricultural abandonment. The inventory used fixed-radius plots with measurements of individual trees and information on the understory flora, which allow direct comparisons of net change in forest biomass and species composition. Although the hurricane eliminated the plot markers, plot locations were carefully recorded on large-scale maps, allowing us to re-establish plots that are on the Prospect Hill Tract. In 2013, we remeasured a stratified subsample of 60 of these plots (representing different soil drainage types and 1800s-era land use). In 2023, we remeasured the live and dead trees in these 60 plots to assess forest development. We also measured tree saplings to assess the extent, composition, and size of advance regeneration to make predictions about the possible future composition of the forest.
