Restoration Of Native Forests Research Articles

Drivers of native species regeneration in the process of restoring natural forests from mono‐specific, even‐aged tree plantations: a quantitative review

A substantial proportion of the existing tree plantations has been established following clearing of native forests. This form of conversion has become widely unaccepted, and there are increasing demands to reverse it through ecological restoration. Yet, there is a lack of integrated knowledge on how best to restore. Here, we reviewed 68 studies to identify the main factors determining establishment success of regeneration of native woody species when restoring natural forests from plantation forests using active and passive approaches, beneath existing canopies, and following their removal. According to the evidence collected, herbivory, within‐gap position, soil properties, and ground cover type and structure had limited influence on regeneration, showing significant effects in less than 26% of cases in which their influence was tested. In contrast, spatial landscape configuration, overstorey structure, ground vegetation structure, overstorey composition, and climate and geomorphology had significant effects in 67, 47, 47, 52, and 63% of cases, respectively. Regeneration diversity and abundance increased with proximity to natural vegetation remnants and seed sources. Lower canopy and understorey stocking levels positively influenced regeneration, as did interventions to reduce them. Canopy cover reduction proved especially effective in warmer regions, in stands of broadleaved species, younger ages (<30 years), higher densities (>1,000 trees/ha), and taller canopies (>20 m). Restoration of native forests can be optimized by adopting interventions that prove most effective, and prioritizing more responsive stand types. However, the specific stand attributes and environmental factors described should be further studied to understand the mechanisms underlying their influence on regeneration.

White‐faced darter distribution is associated with coniferous forests in Great Britain

Abstract Understanding of dragonfly distributions is often geographically comprehensive but less so in ecological terms. White‐faced darter (Leucorhinnia dubia) is a lowland peatbog specialist dragonfly which has experienced population declines in Great Britain. White‐faced darter is thought to rely on peat‐rich pool complexes within woodland, but this has not yet been empirically tested. We used dragonfly recording data collected by volunteers of the British Dragonfly Society from 2005 to 2018 to model habitat preference for white‐faced darter using species distribution models across Great Britain and, with a more detailed landcover data set, specifically in the North of Scotland. Across the whole of Great Britain, our models used the proportion of coniferous forest within 1 km as the most important predictor of habitat suitability but were not able to predict all current populations in England. In the North of Scotland, our models were more successful and suggest that habitats characterised by native coniferous forest and areas with high potential evapotranspiration represent the most suitable habitat for white‐faced darter. We recommend that future white‐faced darter monitoring should be expanded to include areas currently poorly surveyed but with high suitability in the North of Scotland. Our results also suggest that white‐faced darter management should concentrate on maintaining Sphagnum rich‐pool complexes and the maintenance and restoration of native forests in which these pool complexes occur.

Ecological benefits of transfer payment of natural forest protection projects and their impact mechanisms

The policy of natural forest protection project (NFPP) is of great significance to the protection and restoration of natural forests. It remains unclear about how to play the role of NFPP transfer payment in forest ecological benefits. Based on panel data of "China Forestry Statistical Yearbook" from 2011 to 2017, we used forest management area and forest tending area as indicators to measure forest ecological benefits, and used spatial lag model and intermediary effect model to analyze the impacts of the transfer payment funds of NFPP on the forest ecological benefits in key state-owned forest areas. The results showed that forest ecological benefits in the key state-owned forest areas in the second phase of NFPP had improved year by year. There was a significant spatial spillover effect of forest ecological benefits of forestry bureaus. The transfer funds of NFPP had a significant positive effect on the ecological benefits of forest resources in key state-owned forest areas. There was a partial intermediary effect between the improvement of human capital and the establishment of first-line management and protection stations. The central government should increase investment in the transfer payment funds of NFPP. Forest administrations should increase the proportion of funds used in improving human capital and establishing first-line management and protection stations.

Kai: Restoration of the Native Forest for the Conservation of the Craft Tradition of the Pilwa of Lake Budi

The Budi Lake territories are inhabited by Mapuche Lafkenche communities, where their artisans develop the pilwa -bag woven in Chupón fiber- as a traditional craft. The pilwa has been recognized by state organizations for its cultural and ecological value. However, its raw material, the “kai” or Chupón, is declared a vulnerable species. This condition has generated in institutions such as FIA Foundation for Agricultural Innovation, to allocate public resources for its conservation, introducing foreign concepts into the territory for the plant cultivation, which includes the inclusion of plastic in the Mapuche territories. The present paper investigates the cultural aspects of resistance to this vision, and in particular, to the elements of the Mapuche worldview attributed to the species and native forest. The study is based on interviews with Mapuche leaders, indigenous communities and families of Pilwa artisans, who in 2018 raised a project to restore the native forest, for the preservation of the Chupón species and the handcrafted tradition. This project was not funded by the Common Fund. Despite the Mapuche artisan families of the Pilwa, they have started a native forest conservation process in private estates to promote the sustainable land use and maintain the cultural relationship with nature. The findings are expected to support the future community presentation of a native forest restoration project around Lake Budi.

Soil and water conservation effects driven by the implementation of ecological restoration projects: Evidence from the red soil hilly region of China in the last three decades

China’s soil and water conservation (SWC) has gradually developed into a national key ecological construction project, and its scale and coverage have been expanding. However, the distribution characteristics of soil and water conservation measures (SWCMs) under ecological restoration projects and the water storage and soil conservation benefits from a macro perspective are not yet clear. To solve this problem, first of all, the red soil hilly region (RSHR) of China has been chosen to analyze the 30-year process and spatial trends of SWCMs in ecological restoration projects. The spatial distribution of SWCMs is analyzed from the three-dimensional plane of level and elevation. In addition, four benefit characteristics of SWCMs have been obtained by comparing the amount of water and soil protected and the intensity of soil erosion. Finally, the paper explores methods that improve the efficiency of SWC in key areas. The research results show that the paradigm of SWC changes from comprehensive management to ecological rules and the goal of SWCMs has shifted from initial farmland maintenance to natural forest restoration, and the average soil erosion has not only decreased by 291 t/(km2•a) as a whole but has also reflected the transformation from agriculture to ecology in the national ecological restoration project strategy. The distribution model of SWCMs on the horizontal plane is a convex second-order function. In the vertical direction, the proportion of measures distributed in hilly areas was 38%, higher than that in plain and mountain areas. Moreover, SWCMs are concentrated in cultivated land and forest land, among which the proportion of terraces, SWC forests and grass planting measures is as high as 35% in areas with high erosion. For the RSHR in the four SWC benefits of group characteristics and the distribution ratio, respectively: SWC ability and soil erosion intensity are lower (group 1, 9%). There is a lower amount of soil and water storage and higher intensity of soil erosion (group 2, 19%). The amount of soil and water storage is large, and the intensity of soil erosion is low (group 3, 27%). Soil and water storage and soil erosion intensity are both high (group 4, 13%). In a word, it is necessary to improve the proportion of SWC forest construction in river basins and intensive agricultural cultivation areas in national key SWC areas to enhance ecosystem service functions. This paper analyzes the pattern changes and benefit characteristics of SWCMs from a macro perspective, which provides a new perspective for the large-scale study of SWC in the future. This result in preventing soil erosion aims to make China’s ecological civilization construction and ecological management more sustainable.

Quantifying the effect of shading and watering on seed germination in translocated forest topsoil at a subtropical karst of China

Soil translocation is recognized as a promising method to recover degraded ecosystems and save regionally threatened species, however, the diversity and density of woody species, and the similarity of germinated seedlings between translocated site and donor forest are always low, and few studies have paid attention to the manageable environmental factors for seed germination when forest topsoil exposed to strong light condition. In this study, we tested how shading treatment (ST) and watering treatments (WT) affect the germination of species in translocated forest topsoil and whether different life forms respond differently to different ST and WT following soil translocation. We found that the richness of shrub species had a positive linear relationship with WT, and increased by 0.8 species when additional 10 L m−2 water was added. The richness of trees species was positively linearly correlated with ST and increased by 0.5 species when 10 units of shade degrees was increased. The effect of ST on richness was greatest for total species, followed by herb and tree species, while the effect of WT affected these in the order total > herb > shrub species. The densities of shrub and tree species had a positive linear relationship with ST and increased by 1.0 and 1.2 seedlings m−2 when 10 units of shade degrees were increased respectively. Whereas, the densities of total species, herb species, and liana species had a parabolic relation with ST, reaching maximum densities of 79.8, 39.8, and 5.3 seedlings m−2 at shade degrees of 70%, 45%, and 27.5%, respectively. Moreover, the similarity between germinated communities and donor forest had positive linear relationship with ST and WT, except for herb species. Therefore, in theory, ST and WT significantly improved the diversity, density, and similarity of woody seedlings in translocated forest soil, but the density of herb and liana species decreased respectively when shade degrees exceeded 45% and 27.5% respectively. In practice, putting soil under moderate or heavy shade (shade degrees range from 45% to 70%) is a promising method to duplicate a diverse and similar forest if translocation process coincides with the rainy season. This finding can be incorporated into the practice and management of natural forest restoration and accelerate the early stage of forest restoration and succession.

Filling a void: Analysis of early tropical soil and vegetative recovery under leguminous, post‐coal mine reforestation plantations in East Kalimantan, Indonesia

AbstractLand degradation in Borneo, one of the world's richest biodiversity hotspots, is extensive. In East Kalimantan, 5,000,000 ha of land are zoned for surface‐mined coal. Deforestation from this mining threatens biodiversity and results in soil degradation, erosion, and polluted runoff, all directly impacting human populations. Revegetation methods developed for temperate forests are commonly used globally for mine rehabilitation. However, few empirical studies of native forest restoration as part of mine rehabilitation exist from wet tropical regions. Here, a chronosequence was established to observe forest succession under leguminous plantations at the PT Singlurus Pratama coal mine in East Kalimantan, Indonesia. Soil and natural regeneration data were recorded from samples of ten 20 × 60‐m plots randomly located in plantings aged 2, 7, and, 9 years postmining. Linear models (LMEMs) did not reveal greater soil pH, woody plant diversity, or soil phosphorus and nitrogen in older plantings. Rather, they showed higher soil carbon in older plantings, whereas nitrogen and pH were positively correlated with woody species diversity and abundance. Graminoids were less abundant, but ferns were more abundant in older sites in an ordination analysis. The implications are exotic tree plantations shade‐out competitive understory herbaceous species (such as graminoids), opening growing space for other vegetation. However, the establishment of woody species is spatially limited possibly by differences in soil degradation among sites. Our results suggest that planting leguminous trees alone may not be sufficient to restore native forests, and future management should conserve and facilitate the establishment of tropical forest topsoil.

The biodiversity benefit of native forests and mixed‐species plantations over monoculture plantations

AbstractAimChina's Grain for Green Program (GFGP) is the largest reforestation programme in the world and has been operating since 1999. The GFGP has promoted the establishment of tree plantations over the restoration of diverse native forests. In a previous study, we showed that native forests support a higher species richness and abundance of birds and bees than do GFGP plantations and that mixed‐species GFGP plantations support a higher level of bird (but not bee) diversity than do any individual GFGP monocultures (although still below that of native forests). Here, we use metabarcoding of arthropod diversity to test the generality of these results.LocationSichuan, China.MethodsWe sampled arthropod communities using pan traps in the land cover types concerned under the GFGP. These land use types include croplands (the land cover being reforested under the GFGP), native forests (the reference ecosystem as the benchmark for the GFGP’s biodiversity effects) and the dominant GFGP reforestation outcomes: monoculture and mixed‐species plantations. We used COI‐amplicon sequencing (“metabarcoding”) of the arthropod samples to quantify and assess the arthropod community profiles associated with each land cover type.ResultsNative forests support the highest overall levels of arthropod species diversity, followed by mixed‐species plantations, followed by bamboo and other monocultures. Also, the arthropod community in native forests shares more species with mixed‐species plantations than it does with any of the monocultures. Together, these results broadly corroborate our previous conclusions on birds and bees but show a higher arthropod biodiversity value of mixed‐species plantations than previously indicated by bees alone.Main conclusionIn our previous study, we recommended that GFGP should prioritize the conservation and restoration of native forests. Also, where plantations are to be used, we recommended that the GFGP should promote mixed‐species arrangements over monocultures. Both these recommendations should result in more effective protection of terrestrial biodiversity, which is an important objective of China's land‐sustainability spending. The results of this study strengthen these recommendations because our policy prescriptions are now also based on a dataset that includes over 500 species‐resolution taxa, ranging across the Arthropoda.

Spatial Distribution of the Mexican Daisy, Erigeron karvinskianus, in New Zealand under Climate Change

The invasive species Erigeron karvinskianus or Mexican daisy is considered a significant weed that impacts native forest restoration efforts in New Zealand. Mapping the potential distribution of this species under current and future predicted climatic conditions provides managers with relevant information for developing appropriate management strategies. Using occurrences available from global and local databases, spatial distribution characteristics were analyzed using geostatistical tools in ArcMap to characterize current distribution. Species distribution modeling (SDM) using Maxent was conducted to determine the potential spatial distribution of E. karvinskianus worldwide and in New Zealand with projections into future climate conditions. Potential habitat suitability under future climatic conditions were simulated using greenhouse gas emission trajectories under the Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) models RCP2.6, RCP4.5, RCP6.0 and RCP8.5 for years 2050 and 2070. Occurrence data were processed to minimize redundancy and spatial autocorrelation; non-correlated environmental variables were determined to minimize bias and ensure robust models. Kernel density, hotspot and cluster analysis of outliers show that populated areas of Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch have significantly greater concentrations of E. karvinskianus. Species distribution modeling results find an increase in the expansion of range with higher RCP values, and plots of centroids show a southward movement of predicted range for the species.

The challenge of restoring tropical freshwater ecosystems

Abstract We are living a growing worldwide process of degrading the bases of sustaining life. In Brazil, this threat is intensified by the growing fragility of environmental protection structures. Ecological restoration is an alternative to face the degradation of aquatic environments. It has been employed on a larger scale in the developed regions of the planet, but with little convincing results. In Brazil, the experiences are few and specific, limited mainly by complexity and costs. It is necessary to think in a more agile way and act within the possibilities. The restoration with its classic strategies should give way to an “urgent restoration”. This approach considers that we have the basic ecological information and professionals able to act in the resumption of control of the ecological processes that have been altered. Restoration in the condition of urgency implies beginning to think of protection, as a first step, turning attention to the management of the watershed. The way to regain control of the process where it was lost is the integrated management that involves the rational use and protection of the ecosystem. Brazil’s commitment to the Paris climate agreement to restore 12 million hectares of forests and the restoration liabilities on private properties because of the recent Native Vegetation Protection Law are excellent opportunities to act in the integrated management of the river basin and to promote the protection of freshwaters by the restoration of native forests. The restoration of tropical freshwaters and especially the Brazilian ones is something urgent. However, possible solutions must be thought of and can only be constructed when one get involved most people related to the issue. The idea to be nurtured is that restoration involves thinking about the watershed because the threats are beyond the aquatic environment itself, the restoration then also needs to go beyond the aquatic environment itself.

Disturbance or propagule pressure? Unravelling the drivers and mapping the intensity of invasion of free‐ranging dogs across the Atlantic forest hotspot

AbstractAimIdentifying the drivers of biological invasions is crucial to predict the risk of invasion across broad spatial scales and to devise strategies to prevent invasion impacts. Here, we explore the relative importance and synergies between two key drivers—propagule pressure and landscape disturbance—in determining the invasion of native forest remnants by dogs, one of the most abundant, widely distributed, and harmful invasive species worldwide.LocationBrazilian Atlantic Forest.MethodsCombining a camera trap dataset (96 sites in forest remnants) and censuses of populations of dogs raised by humans across 12 landscapes (2,830 ha each), we used N‐mixture models that account for imperfect detection to confront alternative hypotheses of invasion drivers. We then used this empirical evidence to predict the intensity of dog invasion across the Atlantic Forest hotspot.ResultsPropagule pressure (density of raised dogs, positive effect) and landscape disturbance (forest cover, negative effect) were equally important drivers of dog invasion, presenting additive rather than synergistic effects. Dogs invade forest remnants far from their homes, making the density of raised dogs the key component of propagule pressure (relative to dog spatial distribution). Forest cover was more important than either the length or density of forest edges, suggesting that both reduced area of forested barriers to long‐distance movements and increased proximity of forests to edges facilitate dog access to forests. Across the Atlantic Forest, the combination of high human population density and extensive deforestation makes dog invasion an additional and widespread threat.Main conclusionCombined with available maps of priority areas for biodiversity conservation, our spatial prediction of dog invasion can help target areas for integrated management actions. These actions should go beyond measures to control dog populations and encompass the maintenance and restoration of native forests and strategic planning of afforestation through planted forests.

Temperature and agriculture are largely associated with fire activity in Central Chile across different temporal periods

Wildfires have important ecological and socio-economic implications worldwide. Identifying the major ecological drivers regulating fire activity across space and time is critical to formulating sustainable policies of landscape planning and management under global change scenarios. However, large scale studies quantifying the relative importance of relevant fire drivers across different time periods are largely lacking. We conducted a high-resolution spatial survey in Central Chile and used structural equation models (SEMs) to evaluate the direct and indirect effects of climate, human impact, land uses, and topography on the number of fires and burned area across two distinct periods of time (2000–2005 and 2011–2016). Mean temperature and agricultural use had the highest direct positive effect on the number of fires and burned area in the two studied periods, and thus were the major ecological predictors of fire activity. Human impact was also an important predictor of fire attributes. Topography had multiple indirect effects on fire activity by regulating land use, temperature, and human impact, but direct effects were negligible. Precipitation seasonality, drought and aridity indexes, native forests, and plantations, were less relevant predictors of fire activity. Even so, our SEMs suggested that areas dominated by native forests tended to have lower number of fires than those covered by croplands or plantations. Our results suggest that fire activity in Central Chile will be highly sensitive to increases in human pressure, land use change and warming by climate change. Because the relative importance of the predictors of fire activity was steady over time, the knowledge derived from this study provides critical insights for preventive fire management and landscape planning. The control of stubble burning, native forest restoration and sustainable forestry management could improve social adaptation to a fire-prone future.

Major bottlenecks for the restoration of natural forests in Chile

International agreements combined with the recent Chilean Forestry Policy (2015–2035) represent a challenge and an opportunity for forest landscape restoration in Chile. Nevertheless, restoring over 500,000 ha using mainly native species seems like a daunting task by 2035. Here, we discuss the three major bottlenecks that currently constrain the restoration efforts of forest ecosystems in Chile. First, Chile urgently needs a national strategic plan for forest landscape restoration, which should take into account mid‐ and long‐term goals. There is also a need to prioritize resource allocation for efficient use, promoting the creation of economic subsidies for restoration that consider different types of forest ecosystems. Second, there is a great need for better nursery protocols in plant production as well as to strengthen educational programs for professional and technical training, given the lack of high‐quality personnel in Chilean nurseries. This would help increase the currently limited national plant supply, improving quality and increasing the diversity of native species suitable for forest restoration. Lastly, taking advantage of novel eco‐technological tools and promoting innovative plantation design would help to overcome the usually deficient results in the establishment phase, leading to higher survival rates and promoting better performance of native species. Beyond current experiments that are relatively efficient on a small spatial scale, the practice of forest restoration needs to become massive and successful at a landscape scale. More and better applied research is crucial for improving the impact of forest landscape restoration, so that Chile can achieve its forest restoration challenge in the next decade.

Tree plantations displacing native forests: The nature and drivers of apparent forest recovery on former croplands in Southwestern China from 2000 to 2015

China is credited with undertaking some of the world's most ambitious policies to protect and restore forests, which could serve as a role model for other countries. However, the actual environmental consequences of these policies are poorly known. Here, we combine remote-sensing analysis with household interviews to assess the nature and drivers of land-cover change in southwestern China between 2000–2015, after China's major forest protection and reforestation policies came into effect. We found that while the region's gross tree cover grew by 32%, this increase was entirely due to the conversion of croplands to tree plantations, particularly monocultures. Native forests, in turn, suffered a net loss of 6.6%. Thus, instead of truly recovering forested landscapes and generating concomitant environmental benefits, the region's apparent forest recovery has effectively displaced native forests, including those that could have naturally regenerated on land freed up from agriculture. The pursuit of profit from agricultural or forestry production along with governmental encouragement and mobilization for certain land uses – including tree planting – were the dominant drivers of the observed land-cover change. An additional driver was the desire of many households to conform with the land-use decisions of their neighbors. We also found that households' lack of labor or financial resources, rather than any policy safeguards, was the primary constraint on further conversion of native forests. We conclude that to achieve genuine forest recovery along with the resulting environmental benefits, China's policies must more strongly protect existing native forests and facilitate native forest restoration. Natural regeneration, which thus far has been grossly neglected in China's forest policies, should be recognized as a legitimate means of forest restoration. In addition, social factors operating at the household level, notably the pursuit of profit and conformation to social norms, should be harnessed to promote better land-cover, biodiversity, and environmental outcomes. More generally, for China and other countries to succeed in recovering forests, policies must clearly distinguish between native forests and tree plantations.

Not seeing the grass for the trees: Timber plantations and agriculture shrink tropical montane grassland by two-thirds over four decades in the Palani Hills, a Western Ghats Sky Island.

Tropical montane habitats, grasslands, in particular, merit urgent conservation attention owing to the disproportionate levels of endemic biodiversity they harbour, the ecosystem services they provide, and the fact that they are among the most threatened habitats globally. The Shola Sky Islands in the Western Ghats host a matrix of native forest-grassland matrix that has been planted over the last century, with exotic timber plantations. The popular discourse on the landscape change is that mainly forests have been lost to the timber plantations and recent court directives are to restore Shola forest trees. In this study, we examine spatiotemporal patterns of landscape change over the last 40 years in the Palani Hills, a significant part of the montane habitat in the Western Ghats. Using satellite imagery and field surveys, we find that 66% of native grasslands and 31% of native forests have been lost over the last 40 years. Grasslands have gone from being the dominant, most contiguous land cover to one of the rarest and most fragmented. They have been replaced by timber plantations and, to a lesser extent, expanding agriculture. We find that the spatial pattern of grassland loss to plantations differs from the loss to agriculture, likely driven by the invasion of plantation species into grasslands. We identify remnant grasslands that should be prioritised for conservation and make specific recommendations for conservation and restoration of grasslands in light of current management policy in the Palani Hills, which favours large-scale removal of plantations and emphasises the restoration of native forests.

A road for a promising future for China's primates: The potential for restoration.

China is one of the most dynamic countries of the world and it shelters some amazing levels of biodiversity, including some very special primate species. However, primarily as a result of forest loss, most of which occurred in historical times, approximately 70% of China’s primate species have less than 3 000 individuals. Here I evaluate one road for future conservation/development that could produce very positive gains for China’s primates; namely forest restoration. I argue that for a large scale restoration project to be possible two conditions must be met; the right societal conditions must exist and the right knowledge must be in hand. This evaluation suggests that the restoration of native forest to support many of China’s primates holds great potential to advance conservation goals and to promote primate population recovery.

Shifts in an invasive rodent community favoring Black rats (Rattus rattus) following restoration of native forest

AbstractOne potential, unintended ecological consequence accompanying forest restoration is a shift in invasive animal populations, potentially impacting conservation targets. Eighteen years after initial restoration (ungulate exclusion, invasive plant control, and out planting native species) at a 4 ha site on Maui, Hawai'i, we compared invasive rodent communities in a restored native dry forest and adjacent non‐native grassland. Quarterly for 1 year, we trapped rodents on three replicate transects (107 rodent traps) in each habitat type for three consecutive nights. While repeated trapping may have reduced the rat (Black rat, Rattus rattus) population in the forest, it did not appear to reduce the mouse (House mouse, Mus musculus) population in the grassland. In unrestored grassland, mouse captures outnumbered rat captures 220:1, with mice averaging 54.9 indiv./night versus rats averaging 0.25 indiv./night. In contrast, in restored native forest, rat captures outnumbered mouse captures by nearly 5:1, averaging 9.0 indiv./night versus 1.9 indiv./night for mice. Therefore, relatively recent native forest restoration increased Black rat abundance and also increased their total biomass in the restored ecosystem 36‐fold while reducing House mouse biomass 35‐fold. Such a community shift is worrisome because Black rats pose a much greater threat than do mice to native birds and plants, perhaps especially to large‐seeded tree species. Land managers should be aware that forest restoration (i.e. converting grassland to native forest) can invoke shifts in invasive rodent populations, potentially favoring Black rats. Without intervention, this shift may pose risks for intended conservation targets and modify future forest restoration trajectories.

Stimulus of developmental projects to landscape dynamics in Uttara Kannada, Central Western Ghats

Unplanned large scale developmental projects in recent times have been causing alterations in land use land cover [LULC] at spatial and temporal scales with the substantial changes in the landscape. Uttara Kannada district has the distinction of having highest forest cover in India. Forest ecosystems in the district have witnessed major transformations due to industrialization during the post-independence. Impact of developmental activities during the post-independence era, is evident from barren hill tops due to deforestation. The analysis of temporal spatial data acquired through space borne sensors highlights the decline of evergreen-semi evergreen forest cover from 67.73% (1973) to 32.08% (2013). The ad-hoc approaches adopted in the implementation of developmental projects in the ecologically sensitive regions has impaired the ecosystem services affecting the people’s livelihood. The changes in the landscape structure with LULC changes have altered the functional abilities of an ecosystem evident from lowered hydrological yield, disappearing perennial streams, higher instances of human–animal conflicts, declined ecosystem goods, etc. About 64355Ha of forest land is diverted for various non-forestry activities during the last four decades by the government apart from encroachment of 7072Ha of forest area for agriculture, horticulture activities, etc. Encroachment of forest land has resulted in the land degradation leading to reduced productivity. Alterations in bio-geo chemical and hydrological cycles have necessitated the restoration of native forests in the region to ensure water and food security, and livelihood of the local people. Monitoring and visualization of landscape dynamics helps in evolving appropriate management strategies. LULC dynamics analyses considering agents (developmental projects) through fuzzy analytic hierarchy process (AHP) integrated with Markov cellular automata (CA) indicate the developmental projects such as West Coast Paper Mill (WCPM) and Kaiga Nuclear Power House (KNPH) will lead to further fragmentation of forests with spurt in urbanization by 2022. This necessitates framing appropriate policy measures to sustain natural resources focusing on the landscape’s ecological, hydrological, economic and social factors.

Native forest loss in the Chilean biodiversity hotspot: revealing the evidence

The understanding of the spatial and temporal patterns in land use and land cover (LULC) change is a key issue for conservation efforts. In the Chilean hotspot, different studies have attempted to understand variations of LULC change. Nevertheless, a broader understanding of common patterns and variability of LULC over the entire range of the hotspot is lacking. We performed a complete review of the different studies reporting LULC changes and performed a joint analysis of their results using an integrated comprehensive approach. We related the variation of LULC change to latitude, time period and vascular plant richness using generalized linear models. Overall, there were nine studies, which covered 36.5 % of the study area, and reported the loss of 19 % of native forest (782,120 ha) between 1973 and 2011. The highest net forest loss was observed in the 1970–1990 period. This decreased in the 1990–2000 period and rose again in the 2000–2010 period. This result reveals a continuous forest loss in the last 40 years. Conversion of native forest to shrublands is the most important contributor to net native forest loss, accounting for 45 % of the loss. However, in the area of greatest species richness native forests are mainly converted to exotic tree plantations. Chilean forestry model has proved successful in expanding exotic tree plantation, but so far it has not been compatible with native forest conservation and restoration. It is imperative to design a new forestry policy to assure the conservation of one of the most unique biodiversity hotspots worldwide.

Changes in the temperature regime of podzolic soils in the course of natural forest restoration after clearcutting

The results of temperature monitoring in podzolic soils under the middle-taiga bilberry spruce forest and secondary mixed forest of the Komi Republic performed in 2008–2014 are presented. The changes in characteristics of soil temperature in the litter horizon and in the mineral horizons at the depths of 20 and 50 cm are outlined. It is shown that soil temperature regimes differ under the native spruce forest, young growth, and middle-aged secondary mixed forest. The soils of secondary phytocenoses are warmed up to a greater depth and are characterized by the higher heat supply. The differences are seen in a number of temperature parameters, such as the accumulated temperatures above 5°C and above 10°C at the depths of 20 and 50 cm. The most significant differences between the studied plots manifest themselves in the values of temperature amplitudes during the warm season. Maximum values of daily temperature amplitudes were obtained on the plot under young growth, whereas the soil under the middle-aged mixed forest was characterized by minimum values of daily temperature amplitudes.