Harvard Forest Plot Underway

by David A. Orwig

Harvard Forest researchers, with the assistance of scientists from CTFS-SIGEO, began the census of woody stems on June 1, 2010. The 35-ha plot is dominated by eastern hemlock and northern hardwood species and will make an excellent comparison with several other hardwood plots in North America and China at similar latitudes.

To date, over 13,000 stems have been tagged, mapped, and measured, representing approximately 4.5 hectares. Some of the quadrats were particularly dense, containing dense thickets of mountain laurel (Kalmia latifolia). Over the course of the summer, Forest Ecologist David Orwig and six crew members will continue sampling in the western portion of the plot.

The Harvard Forest plot forms part of a global array of large-scale plots established by CTFS-SIGEO, which recently expanded sampling efforts into temperate forests to explore ecosystem processes beyond population dynamics and biodiversity. The geography and size of the plot (500 m x 700 m) was designed to include a continuous, expansive, and varied natural forest landscape that will yield opportunities for the study of forest dynamics and demography while capturing a large amount of existing science infrastructure (e.g., eddy flux towers, gauged sections of a small watershed, existing smaller permanent plots) that will enable the integrated study of ecosystem processes (e.g., biogeochemistry, hydrology, carbon dynamics) and forest dynamics. Thus the resulting data will integrate well with ongoing NSF-funded LTER (Long Term Ecological Research) and NEON (National Ecological Observatory Network) studies.

First census of Yosemite 25-ha plot completed

On Friday July 9, 2010, CTFS-SIGEO partners finished the first census of the 25-ha plot located in Yosemite National Park. Seven temperate plots, at varying stages of enumeration, are now in place in North America.

Field work started last year during the last two weeks of June, when more than 13,000 individual trees in approximately 10 ha were censused. The census of the second half of the plot required about the same number of fieldwork hours as the first.

The Yosemite Forest Dynamics Plot is located near Crane Flat in Yosemite National Park, with white fir (Abies concolor), sugar pine (Pinus lambertiana), and Pacific dogwood (Cornus nuttallii) making up most of the species. The principal investigators are Drs. James Lutz and Andrew Larson.

PHOTOS: By Jim Lutz

Ceremony Opens PNG Research Station

On 24 May 2010, CTFS joined partners to celebrate the opening of the Swire Research Station, which supports field activities related to the 50-ha CTFS plot underway in Wanang, Papua New Guinea.

Bill Rothery, Chairman of John Swire & Sons Pty Steamships, which has contributed USD 250,000 to the project, participated in the celebration along with partners from the New Guinea Binatang Research Center, the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University, the Smithsonian Institution, the University of Minnesota, and PNG officials.

Download clippings of local PNG newspaper coverage of the event.

Planting Trees to Celebrate World Environment Day 2010

by Jefferson Hall

The headlines are not good. A massive oil spill continues to foul the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, and negotiations to curb the increase of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere are in disarray. However, on World Environment Day 2010, we remembered the old environmental movement call to action “Think Globally, Act Locally.”

Photo: HSBC volunteers in Panama joined STRI and the Panama Canal Authority (ACP) on World Environment Day (5 June) to plant 2,500 trees over 2 hectares of land in Soberania National Park, Panama. HSBC-Panama CEO Ernesto Fernandes (center) and Arturo Cerezo (green shirt) from ACP were among the volunteers. Photo by Gian Montufar, STRI.

Despite the headlines and daunting environmental challenges the world faces, we need to remember that global action to address environmental problems starts with individuals and local groups. So on World Environment Day, we chose to do our part for the environment by planting trees. Our partners in the effort were 125 HSBC Bank employees in Panama.

As part of the Agua Salud Project—an ecosystem services research partnership between the Panama Canal Authority, the National Environmental Authority of Panama, HSBC Bank, and the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI)—we enjoyed a day outdoors, doing something positive for the environment. To help control the spread of aggressive invasive canal grass (Saccharum spontaneum) and restore tropical forest within the boundaries of Soberania National Park, we planted 2,500 trees of native species over 2 hectares of land.

Will it work? No one can tell for sure, but in a six-year-old forest planted by STRI’s PRORENA project, we’ve seen the return of countless species of birds, species of primates, and even footprints of a very large cat believed to be a Jaguar—none of which would be there without the forest.

Coordinator of Neotropical Program Appointed: Dr. Tania Brenes Arguedas

We are pleased to announce that Dr. Tania Brenes Arguedas has joined the Center for Tropical Forest Science-Smithsonian Institution Global Earth Observatory (CTFS-SIGEO) to coordinate research and training activities for the Neotropical Program.

Tania joins CTFS-SIGEO following a post-doctoral fellowship at STRI, where she investigated the effects of herbivores, pathogens, drought, and light on tree distributions across the Isthmus of Panama. Tania is originally from Costa Rica. She did her BSc degree at the University of Costa Rica and her PhD at the University of Utah, where she focused on the role of biotic and abiotic factors in shaping the defensive adaptations of the genus Inga.

Tania's experience working in Latin America and studying neotropical forests will help enhance the expanding CTFS-SIGEO program in the region. She is based at the CTFS-SIGEO office in Panama.

HIPPNET: CTFS Partner in Hawai‘i

In a recent article for UCLA’s Center for Tropical Research, Lawren Sack describes the establishment of the Hawai‘i Permanent Plot Network (HIPPNET) and discusses the kinds of critical forest research the project facilitates.

Click here to read Lawren's article and learn about the important work that CTFS partners are doing in Hawai‘i.

Photo by Susan Cordell: Metrosideros polymorpha, Laupahoehoe.

Photo by Susan Cordell: Diospyros sandwicensism, Palamanui.

Harvard Symposium Focuses on Trees and the Global Environment

Last week, the 6th Annual Harvard Plant Biology Symposium drew a crowd of several hundred people to hear (in Cambridge and via the Web) a multidisciplinary group of researchers present some of today’s most advanced science and social science related to trees and the global environment.

The symposium was co-organized and hosted by the Harvard University Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology and CTFS-Arnold Arboretum with support from the HSBC Climate Partnership. See Alvin Powell’s article in the Harvard Gazette for a summary of the symposium. Videos of the talks are available online for viewing at http://arboretum.harvard.edu/research/pbi.html.