Base de données de recherche des TNO

Régions: South Slave Region

étiquettes: physical sciences, climate change, historical data, ecosystem changes, forest ecosystem

Objectif(s): The main objective of the proposed research is to reconstruct the structure of monospecific forests of different ages, and to explore whether or not the recent climate change has affected the structure of the forests in northern Canada. The rationale is that if the changes in the ecosystems that have already occurred in the last few centuries could be estimated, then it should be possible to predict what would happen to the forests in the future under the warming climate conditions.

Description du projet: The main objective of the proposed research is to reconstruct the structure of monospecific forests of different ages, and to explore whether or not the recent climate change has affected the structure of the forests in northern Canada. Pure stands of Jack pine or aspen will be studied in Wood Buffalo National Park. The intent is to determine the effect of the so-called Climate Change on those forests. In particular, the number, height, and thickness of stems that were growing in the forest during the past two centuries will be reconstructed. A recently developed technique will be used for estimating the structure of the forests in the past. In essence, annual rings will be collected from many trees in a forest, and necessary information on the previous condition of the forest will be extracted from the ring patterns. The results will be compared to the structure of the younger forests that grew in more recent, and presumably warmer, years. The duration of the field work will be about six weeks between mid-August and the end of September, 1999.