E&E Seminar: Using short- and long-term forest responses to past climate to better plan for the future by Christine Rollinson, Morton Arboretum
October 9, 2018
12:00 PM - 1:00 PM
Faculty Host: Emily Minor
Abstract: Globally, forests cover 30% of land area, but are responsible for 50% of annual carbon uptake. Locally, only 17% of our historically oak-dominated woodlands remain and today’s forests are facing a rapidly shifting environment that includes habitat fragmentation, species invasion, and climate change. Trees such as oaks can live for centuries and are inherently able to withstand a large amount of environmental variability. Although future climate scenarios are well outside what forests locally and globally have experienced over the past 1000 years, understanding the slow responses of forests to past climate change and human influence can help constrain predictions of future forest structure and functioning. In this talk, I will combine insights from fossil pollen, tree rings, citizen science, and ecosystem modeling to describe how climate has structured forest dynamics in the past and how this can be used to plan for the future.
Date posted
Jul 26, 2018
Date updated
Sep 17, 2018