HR: 17:00h
AN: B44B-05    [Abstracts]
TI: Influence of Land Cover Heterogeneity, Land-Use Change and Management on the Regional Carbon Cycle in the Upper Midwest USA as Evaluated by High-Density Observations and a Dynamic Ecosystem Model
AU: * Desai, A R
EM: adesai@psu.edu
AF: The Pennsylvania State University, Department of Meteorology, 503 Walker Building, University Park, PA 16802 United States
AU: Bolstad, P V
EM: pbolstad@umn.edu
AF: University of Minnesota, Department of Forest Resources, 115 Green Hall 1530 Cleveland Ave N, St. Paul, MN 55108 United States
AU: Moorcroft, P R
EM: paul_moorcroft@harvard.edu
AF: Harvard University, Dept. of Organismic & Evolutionary Biology, HUH 22 Divinity Ave, Cambridge, MA 02138 United States
AU: Davis, K J
EM: davis@met.psu.edu
AF: The Pennsylvania State University, Department of Meteorology, 503 Walker Building, University Park, PA 16802 United States
AB: The interplay between land use change, forest management and land cover variability complicates the ability to characterize regional scale (10-1000 km) exchange of carbon dioxide between the land surface and atmosphere in heterogeneous landscapes. An attempt was made to observe and model these factors and their influence on the regional carbon cycle across the upper Midwest USA. A high density of eddy-covariance carbon flux, micrometeorology, carbon dioxide mixing ratio, stand-scale biometry and canopy component flux observations have been occurring in this area as part of the Chequamegon Ecosystem-Atmosphere Study. Observations limited to sampling only dominant stands and coarse-resolution biogeochemical models limited to biome-scale parameterization neither accurately capture the variability of carbon fluxes measured by the network of eddy covariance towers nor match the regional-scale carbon flux inferred from very tall tower eddy covariance measurements and multi-site upscaling. Analysis of plot level biometric data, U.S. Forest Service Forest Inventory Analysis data and high-resolution land cover data around the tall tower revealed significant variations in vegetation type, stand age, canopy stocking and structure. Wetlands, clearcuts and recent natural disturbances occur in characteristic small non-uniformly distributed patches that aggregate to form more than 30% of the landscape. The Ecosystem Demography model, a dynamic ecosystem model that incorporates vegetation heterogeneity, canopy structure, stand age, disturbance, land use change and forest management, was parameterized with regional biometric data and meteorology, historical records of land management and high-resolution satellite land cover maps. The model will be used to examine the significance of past land use change, natural disturbance history and current forest management in explaining landscape structure and regional carbon fluxes observed in the region today.
UR: http://met.psu.edu/~adesai
DE: 0414 Biogeochemical cycles, processes, and modeling (0412, 0793, 1615, 4805, 4912)
DE: 0428 Carbon cycling (4806)
DE: 0439 Ecosystems, structure and dynamics (4815)
DE: 1637 Regional climate change
SC: Biogeosciences [B]
MN: Fall Meeting 2005