Water availability limits tree productivity, carbon stocks, and carbon residence time in mature forests across the western US

Berner, Logan T.; Law, Beverly E.; Hudiburg, Tara W.

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-14-365-2017

Articles | Volume 14, issue 2

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-14-365-2017

© Author(s) 2017. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Special issue:

Ecosystem processes and functioning across current and future...

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-14-365-2017

© Author(s) 2017. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Articles | Volume 14, issue 2

Research article

|

24 Jan 2017

Research article |

| 24 Jan 2017

Water availability limits tree productivity, carbon stocks, and carbon residence time in mature forests across the western US

Logan T. Berner, Beverly E. Law, and Tara W. Hudiburg

Data sets

MODIS LAI NASA https://reverb.echo.nasa.gov/reverb/

MODIS NPPs NTSG http://www.ntsg.umt.edu/project/mod17#data-product

Satellite-derived biomass data sets ORNL DAAC https://daac.ornl.gov/

Satellite-derived biomass data sets US Forest Service https://www.fs.usda.gov/rds/archive/

Forest inventory data US Forest Service Forest Inventory and Analysis https://www.fia.fs.fed.us/

Short summary

Much of the western US is projected to become warmer and drier over the coming century. We examined how tree productivity, biomass, and carbon residence time varied with average water availability across this region using field and satellite measurements. Each forest characteristic increased markedly with increasing water availability between the dry woodlands and temperate rain forests, underscoring that water availability is a key environmental constraint on forests in the region.