Influence of vegetation cover on thermal regime of mountainous catchments

Abstract

Air temperature at heights of 5 and 200 cm above soil surface, as well as soil temperature at depths of 15, 30 and 60 cm were studied in the cold climatic zone at three localities (catchments) under different plant cover during the growing season of 2002. The catchments Kout (dead forest), Doupě (clearing) and Stolec (mature spruce forest) are situated in the National Park of the Sumava Mts. (Czech Republic) in elevation of 1105–1330 m a.s.l., in which Kout and Doupě form some small “islands” inside an extensive spruce forest. Plant transpiration was not limited by water shortage in all the three localities. It was found that both soil and air temperatures were influenced with plant cover. In hot and dry days, the extremes in daily and night air temperatures were a function of transpiring vegetation height, with higher daily maximum and lower night minimum for smaller vegetation. For the whole growing season (from 29 July to 10 October 2002), the mean values of air temperature were independent upon the plant cover, but the magnitude of the dispersion variance followed the sequence in ascending order: mature forest-clearing-dead forest.