Jan

28

2008
 
 

It’s always the little guys



Natural disturbances likely to turn Canada’s forests into carbon source, not sink

pine beetles must find life so boringCanada has seven percent of the world’s forests, and they are looking like a liability. Far from being a carbon sink, say the Canadian Forest Service authors of a study published in PNAS, climate change will mean they produce a net surplus of carbon in more years than not. To make matters worse, according to Werner Kurz and colleagues, the scale of the emissions is completely unpredictable because they are driven by natural disturbances such as fire and disease outbreaks. Of these, two insect species play the lead roles: the mountain pine beetle Dendroctonus ponderosae and spruce budworm Choristoneura fumiferana. Taking it in turns to wreak havoc upon hundreds of thousands of square kilometres of forest, they force salvage logging operations that bring the trees’ locked-up carbon back into circulation sooner than anticipated. With fire intensities set to worsen in coming decades and the next major budworm outbreak imminent, some creative solutions to the problem of what to do about boreal forests are needed fast. Source: Kurz WA, Stinson G, Rampley GJ, Dymond CC & Neilson ET (2008) Risk of natural disturbances makes future contribution of Canada’s forests to the global carbon cycle highly uncertain. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0708133105

Related story in Conservation magazine: That Sinking Feeling

Image © William Ciesla

Filed Under Climate change, Habitat, Invasive species, Monitoring, Economics and conservation, Socio-political issues | 

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