Intact Forest Cover Research Articles

Financial Comparison of Continuous-Cover Forestry, Rotational Forest Management and Permanent Carbon Forest Regimes for Redwood within New Zealand

Continuous-cover forestry (CCF), which maintains a relatively intact forest cover through selective harvesting, has emerged over the last few decades as a popular alternative to rotational forest management (RFM). Coast redwood, which is native to the western United States, grows rapidly in New Zealand and is well suited to CCF as it has high shade tolerance, an ability to coppice from the cut stem, and resistance to pests, diseases, wind and fire. A forest estate model was used to compare the carbon sequestration, timber production and profitability of redwood CCF, RFM and permanent carbon forestry (PCF) regimes at a regional level within New Zealand. Through linear programming, this model optimised carbon accumulation and harvesting decisions across a large forest to meet a series of constraints associated with each regime. All three regimes represented good investment decisions, but CCF had the highest soil expectation value (SEV) within most North Island regions while PCF had a slightly higher SEV within the South Island regions. Under the transitional CCF (CCFt), revenue from carbon initially increased before levelling out at 40 years, after which time a sustainable harvest of high-value timber commenced in perpetuity without additional revenue from carbon. The CCFt regime transitioned to a steady-state condition, with a uniform age class distribution from year 150 onwards (CCFs), after which time a very high SEV was attained that exceeded that of CCFt by four-fold in the North Island (NZD 136,126/ha vs. NZD 34,430/ha) and seven-fold (NZD 44,714 vs. NZD 6267/ha) in the South Island. This study highlights the profitability of managing redwood under CCF and how initial carbon revenue can be used to finance the transition of the forest to a steady-state condition that produces a stream of valuable timber with a very high rate of return.

Consumed from within? Social and ecological drivers of internal clearings in Ethiopian Orthodox church forests

AbstractIn a largely deforested landscape, thousands of small pockets of indigenous forest remain in Ethiopia's northern highlands. These “church forests” are maintained by Ethiopian Orthodox church communities, and they provide valuable reserves of indigenous species diversity and ecosystem services. However, there are important trade‐offs between the different ecosystem services church forests provide: the size of community‐made clearings within church forests used for prayer and other church services have to be balanced with services derived from intact forest cover and dense vegetation. This research uses a spatial, social–ecological model to examine patterns in church forest size and vegetation density across 2743 church forests in the Amhara Region. Results suggest that larger internal clearings correlate with larger forest area, and clearings also scale with population size. We also find that greater elevation and distance to population centers are associated with higher church forest density, while greater community wealth is associated with reduced forest density and area. These trends initially suggest that internal clearings can support conservation efforts, but they are nuanced by prevalent non‐native Eucalyptus planting and increasing internal deforestation for graveyard space for wealthier communities. Additionally, we find that internal clearings are an important source of omitted variable bias in estimating the relationship between density and area in church forests. As a consequence, incorporating church clearings into social–ecological models leads to meaningful differences in church forest density and area estimates. Ultimately, this study suggests that church forests in Ethiopia may be sustained rather than consumed from within.

Land use conversion to agriculture impacts biodiversity, erosion control, and key soil properties in an Andean watershed

AbstractThe conversion of natural vegetation to agricultural land uses in mountainous Andean landscapes threatens an array of key ecological processes and ecosystem services (ES). In protected areas and buffer regions that provide water to cities, it is critical to understand how interactions between plants and soil communities sustain a range of ecosystem functions associated with nutrient recycling, soil structure, and erosion control. We sought to examine how land use conversion within a mountainous tropical forest landscape influences the diversity of vegetation and soil macrofauna communities, soil physicochemical properties, and hydrological regulation services. Biodiversity and a suite of key soil‐based ES were compared in five major land uses of the Cali River watershed: (1) annual cropping systems, (2) coffee plantations, (3) pastures, (4) abandoned shrubland, and (5) secondary forests. The diversity of woody and herbaceous vegetation, as well as soil macrofauna, was assessed in each land use. Soil chemical fertility and aggregate morphology were assessed via laboratory analyses and visual separation of soil aggregates based on their origin. Infiltration, runoff, and sediment production were measured using a portable rainfall simulator. We found a decrease in the diversity of woody vegetation across land uses to be associated with lower diversity of soil macrofauna. At the same time, agricultural management, annual crops in particular, supports the largest earthworm populations, likely due to increased organic inputs and low impact tillage, which appears not to diminish soil fertility and water infiltration. In contrast, the low soil fertility in pastures was associated with the lowest values of soil C, poor aggregation, and high bulk density and likely reflects overgrazing, with negative implications for water infiltration and erosion. Associations between the different sets of variables, evaluated with co‐inertia analysis, highlight the hierarchical relevance of plant cover and woody diversity on ES. The biological complexity associated with intact forest cover appears to generate “bundles” of co‐occurring ES, with this land use demonstrating the highest infiltration, and low runoff and sediment losses. Our findings demonstrate that forests and tree‐based agricultural systems may better contribute to the provision of multiple ES, including biodiversity conservation and hydrologic regulation.

Forested watersheds mitigate the thermal degradation of headwater fish assemblages under future climate change

AbstractCertain habitat features of stream ecosystems can reduce their sensitivity to climate change and help protect the integrity of cold‐water aquatic resources. Identifying such features is imperative for conserving the climate refugia of cold‐water species. Using a combination of stream temperature and fish assemblage data, we quantified thermal sensitivities of 192 headwater streams in Northwest Pennsylvania to identify which landscape features best explained stream susceptibility to temperature change. We then projected changes in native brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis) distributions, non‐native brown trout (Salmo trutta) distributions and declines in cold‐water thermal integrity under future climate warming and land use change scenarios. Brook trout were predicted to become increasingly relegated to smaller streams under future stream warming. However, we found that streams with intact forest cover at the watershed level had low thermal sensitivities, which slowed rates of projected warming. As a result, streams with forested watersheds were predicted to have smaller declines in thermal integrity and lower extirpation probabilities of brook trout. Additionally, non‐native brown trout were not predicted to expand distributions under projected warming, suggesting minimal synergistic effects between non‐native species and climate change. Forest cover buffers headwater streams from the effects of global change, similar to how groundwater inputs reduce the rate of stream warming. Forest restoration at riparian and watershed levels should help mitigate thermal‐induced degradation of cold‐water aquatic resources.

Biogeography and anthropogenic impact shape the success of invasive wasps on New Zealand's offshore islands

AbstractAimThe theory of island biogeography predicts that the susceptibility of an island to invasion is determined by its isolation and size. However, many island ecosystems have been intensely modified by humans. Here, we investigated the biogeographic, biotic and anthropogenic drivers of invasive social wasps on 36 offshore islands.LocationIslands off the east coast of New Zealand's North Island.TaxaVespula germanica(Fabricius, 1793),Vespula vulgaris(Linnaeus, 1758) andPolistes chinensis antennalis(Fabricius, 1793), Polistes humilis(Fabricius, 1781).MethodsWe used GIS software for in situ randomization of plots on each island (36 islands, 409 plots) and conducted 5‐min wasp counts to estimate wasp abundance. Wasp abundance and canopy cover were recorded at each plot. Island isolation was measured using GIS software. Data on island size, human settlement and the presence of introduced rats (Rattusspp.) were collated from the literature and island managers. The number of boat docks per island was counted from satellite images. A generalized linear mixed‐effect model (GLMM) was fitted to identify drivers ofVespulaandPolistesabundance on offshore islands.ResultsThe abundance ofVespulawas negatively correlated with island isolation and canopy cover, yet positively correlated with island size.Vespulawere also more abundant on islands that have been settled by humans. The abundance ofPolisteswas negatively correlated with canopy cover. Finally, results did not support the notion that invasive wasps were associated with introduced rats on New Zealand's offshore islands.ConclusionsOur findings highlight the importance of biogeographic factors, such as island size and isolation, for species invasions, and suggest that intact forest cover could contribute to biotic resistance to invasive wasps in island ecosystems. Studies of invasive species should consider the joint effects of biogeographic, biotic and anthropogenic factors to best inform conservation management.

Additionality and Forest Conservation Regulation for Residential Development

AbstractWe analyze the potential effects that a unique forest conservation regulation has on residential development, and assess the additionality in forest cover due to this regulation. We combine panel data on forest cover change from satellite imagery and parcel‐level modeling on residential development, including residential subdivisions occurring before and after the regulation is adopted. Our results suggest that after adoption, there was a 21% increase in forest cover within subdivisions relative to the amount without the regulation. The heterogeneous effects of this regulation suggest that on average, forest cover increased for parcels with lower levels of existing forest cover. However, parcels with the highest levels of forest cover continue to have significant decreases in forest cover, despite the regulation, thereby resulting in fragmentation in regions with the most intact forest cover.

Distinguishing Land Change from Natural Variability and Uncertainty in Central Mexico with MODIS EVI, TRMM Precipitation, and MODIS LST Data

Precipitation and temperature enact variable influences on vegetation, impacting the type and condition of land cover, as well as the assessment of change over broad landscapes. Separating the influence of vegetative variability independent and discrete land cover change remains a major challenge to landscape change assessments. The heterogeneous Lerma-Chapala-Santiago watershed of central Mexico exemplifies both natural and anthropogenic forces enacting variability and change on the landscape. This study employed a time series of Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI) composites from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectoradiometer (MODIS) for 2001–2007 and per-pixel multiple linear regressions in order to model changes in EVI as a function of precipitation, temperature, and elevation. Over the seven-year period, 59.1% of the variability in EVI was explained by variability in the independent variables, with highest model performance among changing and heterogeneous land cover types, while intact forest cover demonstrated the greatest resistance to changes in temperature and precipitation. Model results were compared to an independent change uncertainty assessment, and selected regional samples of change confusion and natural variability give insight to common problems afflicting land change analyses.

Geospatial analysis of forest fragmentation in Uttara Kannada District, India

Landscapes consist of heterogeneous interacting dynamic elements with complex ecological, economic and cultural attributes. These complex interactions help in the sustenance of natural resources through bio-geochemical and hydrological cycling. The ecosystem functions are altered with changes in the landscape structure. Fragmentation of large contiguous forests to small and isolated forest patches either by natural phenomena or anthropogenic activities leads to drastic changes in forest patch sizes, shape, connectivity and internal heterogeneity, which restrict the movement leading to inbreeding among Meta populations with extirpation of species. Landscape dynamics are assessed through land use analysis by way of remote sensing data acquired at different time periods. Forest fragmentation is assessed at the pixel level through computation of two indicators, i.e., P f (the ratio of pixels that are forested to the total non-water pixels in the window) and P ff (the proportion of all adjacent (cardinal directions only) pixel pairs that include at least one forest pixel, for which both pixels are forested). Uttara Kannada District has the distinction of having the highest forest cover in Karnataka State, India. This region has been experiencing changes in its forest cover and consequent alterations in functional abilities of its ecosystem. Temporal land use analyses show the trend of deforestation, evident from the reduction of evergreen - semi evergreen forest cover from 57.31 % (1979) to 32.08 % (2013) Forest fragmentation at the landscape level shows a decline of interior forests 64.42 % (1979) to 25.62 % (2013) and transition of non-forest categories such as crop land, plantations and built-up areas, amounting now to 47.29 %. PCA prioritized geophysical and socio variables responsible for changes in the landscape structure at local levels. Terrestrial forest ecosystems in Uttara Kannada District of Central Western Ghats have been experiencing threats due to deforestation with land use changes and fragmentation of contiguous forests, as is evident from the decline of interior forests and consequent increases in patch, transitional, edge and perforated forests. Interior or intact forest cover in this ecologically fragile region is now 25.62 %. Considering the accelerating rates of forest fragmentation in recent times, the focus should be on reforestation and regeneration of natural vegetation to sustain food and water security and the livelihood of local populations. This requires innovation with holistic approaches in the management of forests by involving all local stakeholders to minimize the encroachment of forests, and improvements in regeneration.

Additionality and Forest Conservation Regulation for Residential Development

We analyze the potential effects of a unique forest conservation regulation on residential development and assess the additionality in forest cover due to this regulation. We combine panel data on forest cover change from satellite imagery and parcel-level modeling on residential development, including residential subdivisions occurring before and after regulation adoption. Our results suggest that after the regulation, there was a 23% increase in forest cover within subdivisions relative to the amount without the regulation. The heterogeneous effects of this regulation suggest that forest cover increased on average for parcels with lower levels of existing forest cover. However, parcels with the highest levels of forest cover continue to have significant decreases in forest cover, despite the regulation, thereby resulting in fragmentation in regions with the most intact forest cover.

Expansion of Oil Palm Plantations and Forest Cover Changes in Bungo and Merangin Districts, Jambi Province, Indonesia

It is often cited that large scale oil palm plantation were responsible for forest cover changes in Sumatra and Kalimantan. Objective of the research was to identify whether oil palm concessions were the direct cause of intact forest cover changes in study area. The study areas are situated at Jambi Province, Indonesia and are experiencing rapid expansion of oil palm plantation. We used Landsat temporal images from year 1988, 1990, 2000, 2007, and 2013 to detect forest cover change. We also made use Carnegie Landsat Analysis System–Lite (CLASlite) fractional cover module to differentiate undisturbed (intact), disturbed (logged) forest and also oil palm growing stages on Landsat images. Our study showed that, there were only 8% of oil palm plantation development occurred by direct clearing of intact forest in the study area in the last 25 years. Oil palm concessions in the last 25 years were mostly developed on logged forest, agroforests, and shrub lands.

Becoming Europe: Southeast Asia in the Anthropocene

When I visited the Southeast Asian tropics as an undergraduate in 1973 it seemed as different from my European home as anywhere on Earth could be. The forest was already in retreat, but large contiguous tracts remained virtually intact. Fast-forward 40 years, however, and more than half of the original forest cover of Southeast Asia has gone, more than half of what remains has been logged or otherwise degraded, and the majority, logged or unlogged, has lost most or all of its large vertebrate fauna to hunting (Corlett, 2009). The non-forest areas are increasingly dominated by plantation monocultures, or by urban areas and their associated infrastructure, and most of the native biota is confined to areas with more or less intact forest cover, while a few native species and an increasing number of exotics have massively expanded their populations. Air pollution and nitrogen deposition are pervasive, but unstudied, problems and the impacts of climate change are becoming apparent. The crop monocultures are trees rather than cereals, but in other ways the region is fast becoming a tropical version of Europe. The densely-populated Philippines and Vietnam have similar human population densities to Belgium and the UK, and relatively sparsely populated Laos to Sweden (Table 1). At the regional scale, Southeast Asia has a somewhat higher mean population density than the European Union (EU) and, since it is still less urbanized, rural population densities are even higher. The per-capita GDPs of the richer countries in Southeast Asia (excluding tiny Singapore and oil-rich Brunei) already overlap with the poorer countries in the EU, and are rising more rapidly. Other statistics are also converging, including infant mortality, life expectancy, and total fertility rates (Table 1). Both regions were once largely forested and their total remaining forest cover is similar today (44% for TEA, 37% for the EU), as is the variation among countries, although nowhere in Southeast Asia has as little forest left as the Netherlands, Ireland and the UK. Both regions have suffered few known extinctions in historical times (iucnredlist.org). Despite these similarities, Europe is considered a relative success story in conservation terms, while Southeast Asia is widely seen as an on-going biodiversity crisis (Sodhi et al., 2004, 2010; Wilcove et al., 2013). There are good reasons for this. First, there is much more biodiversity at stake in Southeast Asia, which, in well-studied groups, supports 15–25% of global terrestrial species (Corlett, 2009). Europe, by contrast, has considerably fewer species (, 5% of the global total) in a similar total land area. Secondly, species in tropical forests are likely to be more vulnerable to extinction, both because high biodiversity means small population sizes, but also because of the extreme contrast between the environment of closed-canopy tropical forests and the anthropogenic habitats that replace them. Few non-coastal native species can survive outside forest in Southeast Asia, while many have adapted to human-dominated landscapes in Europe. Thirdly, the ecological transformation of Southeast Asia has been extremely rapid and the persistence of many species only as tiny, isolated populations implies large extinction debts. Moreover, while European landscapes are now changing relatively slowly, there is no sign of a slowdown in Southeast Asia, implying a future with less forest and fewer species. Finally, Europe is the ecologically best-known region of the planet, while Southeast Asia is still among the least, to the detriment of conservation planning and implementation. This new tropical landscape calls for a new tropical ecology: one that does not require large tracts of pristine forest, or ‘fragments’ of this forest isolated in a uniformly hostile matrix. An ecology of patches of irregular size, shape, history and composition, of novel ecosystems that combine species which have not previous met, of chronic disturbances and ubiquitous edge effects, of heterogeneity and change. European ecologists have always worked in such landscapes, since they have no others, but the foundations of this new ‘tropical countryside ecology’ have been laid in the most densely populated areas of the Neotropics, Domain Editor-in-Chief Donald R. Zak, University of Michigan

Committed carbon emissions, deforestation, and community land conversion from oil palm plantation expansion in West Kalimantan, Indonesia

Industrial agricultural plantations are a rapidly increasing yet largely unmeasured source of tropical land cover change. Here, we evaluate impacts of oil palm plantation development on land cover, carbon flux, and agrarian community lands in West Kalimantan, Indonesian Borneo. With a spatially explicit land change/carbon bookkeeping model, parameterized using high-resolution satellite time series and informed by socioeconomic surveys, we assess previous and project future plantation expansion under five scenarios. Although fire was the primary proximate cause of 1989-2008 deforestation (93%) and net carbon emissions (69%), by 2007-2008, oil palm directly caused 27% of total and 40% of peatland deforestation. Plantation land sources exhibited distinctive temporal dynamics, comprising 81% forests on mineral soils (1994-2001), shifting to 69% peatlands (2008-2011). Plantation leases reveal vast development potential. In 2008, leases spanned ∼65% of the region, including 62% on peatlands and 59% of community-managed lands, yet <10% of lease area was planted. Projecting business as usual (BAU), by 2020 ∼40% of regional and 35% of community lands are cleared for oil palm, generating 26% of net carbon emissions. Intact forest cover declines to 4%, and the proportion of emissions sourced from peatlands increases 38%. Prohibiting intact and logged forest and peatland conversion to oil palm reduces emissions only 4% below BAU, because of continued uncontrolled fire. Protecting logged forests achieves greater carbon emissions reductions (21%) than protecting intact forests alone (9%) and is critical for mitigating carbon emissions. Extensive allocated leases constrain land management options, requiring trade-offs among oil palm production, carbon emissions mitigation, and maintaining community landholdings.

Dynamic performance assessment of protected areas

Recognizing the importance of preserving biodiversity and ecosystem services, human society has established extensive protected area networks to conserve these resources in recent decades. Are protected areas working as expected? Empirical coarse-scale assessments of this question across large regions, or even globally, tend to answer “yes”, while fine-scale studies of individual protected areas often and repeatedly answer “no”. We conducted a first fine-scale analysis of Brazil’s extensive Amazonian protected area network (1.8millionkm2) and have quantitatively estimated conservation effectiveness in light of changing human development pressures in the surrounding landscape. The overall network maintained intact forest cover for 98.6% of protected forest lands, largely agreeing with previous coarse-scale studies. However, detailed examination of 474 individual protected areas unveils a broad range of efficacy. Many protected areas (544,800km2) experience default protection simply due to their remoteness. Many others (396,100km2) have provided highly effective protection in the face of substantial human development pressure. Conversely, 12% (38) of protected areas have failed to protect the 27,300km2 that they encompass, and another 7% (23) provide only marginal protection of 37,500km2. Comprehensive landscape assessments of protected area networks, with frequent monitoring at scales matching the patterns of human-caused disturbances, are necessary to ensure the conservation effectiveness and long term survival of protected areas in rapidly changing landscapes. The methods presented here are globally adaptable to all forested protected areas.

Conservation in Sustainable-Use Tropical Forest Reserves

trialspecies,therelativemeritsofdifferentapproachesto ensure the long-term persistence of those species remain highly contentious. Most would agree, however, that both establishing protected areas and exercising some form of restraint on extraction of forest resources are among the most effective of all viable conservation measures. Deforestation, wildfires, logging, and hunting are among the leading drivers of species losses in tropical forests, and de facto or de jure protection from these threats can be conferred by either effective enforcement of regulations or physical remoteness. Attempts to assess conservation success of protected areasatlargescaleshaverestedprimarilyonconventional use of remote sensing to quantify spatial or temporal differences in rates of change in land cover due to deforestation and wildfires, rather than on empirical demographic or community-level metrics (Gaston et al. 2008). Q2 However, the former approaches fail to detect most types of subcanopy anthropogenic disturbances that also result, directly or indirectly, in species losses (Peres et al. 2006). Moreover, the effects of habitat loss and degradation on population extirpations and declines are nonlinear, so vegetation cover alone is rarely a robust proxy for the viability of terrestrial biotas. Remotesensing data show vast tracts of apparently intact tropical forests, but in reality levels of hunting and other forms of extraction in these areas are often unsustainable (Peres & Lake 2003). Fundamental questions yet to be answered include whether ostensibly intact protected areas retain full complements of forest species and how the extent of cryptic patterns of disturbance is related to human population density in both protected and unprotected areas. I considered the global to regional emergence of sustainable-use reserves, emphasizing the world’s largest tropical forest region, Amazonia. Sustainable-use reserves often have intermediate levels of disturbance, so I examined the degree of use of natural resources by resident communities and used human population density as a proxy for level of extraction. In both protected and unprotected areas, I also estimated responses of game vertebrate assemblages to hunting on the basis of the relative biomassextractedfromasubsetoftheforestfauna.Iused analysesofcovariance(ANCOVA)toexaminetheassociationbetweenhumandensityandgamebiomassharvested across different reserve categories. Finally, I considered the long-term capacity of sustainable-use forest reserves to maintain populations of all resident species.

An Evaluation of Farmers’ Participation in Afforestation Programme in Kogi State, Nigeria

Extensive deforestation has reduced the 65 million hectares of intact forest cover of 1897 in Nigeria to thepresent 4 million hectares. The consequences of this unhealthy development have resulted to environmentaldegradation and accelerated wind and water erosion of the fertile land that has also left Nigerian soil too poor forsustainable agricultural production. Reforestation through small-scale village based farmers’ participation nowform one of the strategies embarked upon by several agencies in Nigeria including Kogi afforestation project.This study attempts to evaluate farmers’ participation in afforestation project in Kogi State. Structuredquestionnaire was used to interview 120 participants. Descriptive statistics, adoption index and sigma methodwere used to describe socio-economic characteristics, participation methods and to measure the level of adoptionwhile chi-square was used to find differences between income generated from adoption of the variousafforestation technologies. Findings reveal that 67 percent of the farmers had little or no formal education, morethan 30 percent of the farmers underwent passive participation in afforestation while adoption of improvedseedlings, exotic trees and pure stand technologies received high score of 4.90, 4.74 and 4.44 respectively. Seedscarification and harvesting by chipping technologies received the least adoption score of 2.61 and 2.94. Thechi-square test adjudged that there was a significant difference between income generated and type of technologyadopted. This study recommends that more pragmatic interactive participation method that will give room forjoint analysis of action plan and formation of local institutions should be put in place.

Status Review of Namdapha National Park, India: Need for Strengthening Community-Conservation Linkages

The North East India is among the most significant global hotspots of biodiversity, and state of Arunachal Pradesh covers 32% of total area of the region. In comparison to the other neighbouring states and countries, large areas of the State of Arunachal Pradesh are under intact forest cover that provides unique opportunity to conserve biodiversity within the protected areas. This paper analyses the status of biodiversity and management of Namdapha National Park, which is also a Tiger Project and is under the active consideration of Biosphere Reserve Status. The Park falls among the select relict rainforest patches of high global significance, and has been identified as an epicenter of high endemism and biodiversity with over 1119 plants and 1399 faunal species in an area of 1985 km2 (elevation variation 200-4570 m above sea level). It also provides unique habitats to four Wild Cats (Tiger, Leopard, Snow Leopard and Clouded Leopard) and only Ape (Hollock Gibbon) in India, thus conservation of this Park has larger implications not only for India but for whole of the South-east Asian countries. There has been communities living around the Park, a few settlements within the Park area are of major concern for the conservation of biodiversity. Besides, grazing, hunting, and NTFPs collections, particularly in the fringe areas, are other major threats to the biodiversity of the Park. The management suffers due to lack of proper infrastructure, enough manpower and trained personnel, which has been a major constraint in recent times. The paper highlights the need of strengthening community conservation linkages by educating people and addressing the issues of settlement, NTFP collection and hunting involving local communities in the management of Park around its buffer zone I addition to building capacity of Park management staff. Preparing comprehensive eco-development programmes for different areas and communities in and around the Park is an important issue to address long-term management of the area.