A meta-analysis on the impacts of partial cutting on forest structure and carbon storage

[摘要] Partial cutting, which removes some individual trees from a forest, is one ofthe major and widespread forest management practices that can significantlyalter both forest structure and carbon (C) storage. Using 748 observationsfrom 81 studies published between 1973 and 2011, we synthesized the impactsof partial cutting on three variables associated with forest structure (meanannual growth of diameter at breast height (DBH), stand basal area, andvolume) and four variables related to various C stock components (abovegroundbiomass C (AGBC), understory C, forest floor C, and mineral soil C). Resultsshow that the growth of DBH increased by 111.9% after partial cutting,compared to the uncut control, with a 95% bootstrapped confidenceinterval ranging from 92.2 to 135.9%, while stand basal area and volumedecreased immediately by 34.2% ([−37.4%, −31.2%]) and28.4% ([−32.0%, −25.1%]), respectively. On average,partial cutting reduced AGBC by 43.4% ([−47.7%, −39.3%]),increased understory C storage by 391.5% ([220.0%, 603.8%]),but did not show significant effects on C stocks on forest floor and inmineral soil. All the effects, if significant (i.e., on DBH growth, standbasal area, volume, and AGBC), intensified linearly with cutting intensityand decreased linearly over time. Overall, cutting intensity had more strongimpacts than the length of recovery time on the responses of those variablesto partial cutting. Besides the significant influence of cutting intensityand recovery time, other factors such as climate zone and forest type alsoaffected forest responses to partial cutting. For example, a large fractionof the changes in DBH growth remains unexplained, suggesting the factors notincluded in the analysis may play a major role. The data assembled in thissynthesis were not sufficient to determine how long it would take for acomplete recovery after cutting because long-term experiments were scarce.Future efforts should be tailored to increase the duration of the experimentsand balance geographic locations of field studies.

[学科分类] 地球化学与岩石