Carbon Cycle of a Maritime Ancient Temperate Broadleaved Woodland at Seasonal and Annual Scales
This study compares different approaches to quantifying the carbon cycle in a temperate deciduous forest at Wytham Woods in England, which is unusual in its maritime climate and mixed age structure, reflecting low levels of past management. We tested whether eddy covariance and biometric measurement...
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Published in | Ecosystems (New York) Vol. 18; no. 1; pp. 1 - 15 |
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Main Authors | , , , , |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
Boston
Springer-Verlag
01.01.2015
Springer Science+Business Media Springer US Springer Springer Nature B.V |
Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
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Summary: | This study compares different approaches to quantifying the carbon cycle in a temperate deciduous forest at Wytham Woods in England, which is unusual in its maritime climate and mixed age structure, reflecting low levels of past management. We tested whether eddy covariance and biometric measurements gave consistent estimates of woodland productivity and ecosystem respiration at monthly and annual timescales. Biometric methods estimated gross primary productivity (GPP) as 22.0 ± 1.6 Mg C ha⁻¹ y⁻¹, close to the eddy covariance GPP value of 21.1 Mg C ha⁻¹ y⁻¹. Annual ecosystem respiration (RECO) was similar, at 20.3 ± 1.5 Mg C ha⁻¹ y⁻¹for biometric and 19.8 Mg C ha⁻¹ y⁻¹for eddy covariance. The seasonal cycle of monthly biometric and eddy covariance RECOestimates also closely matched. Net primary productivity (NPP) was 7.0 ± 0.8 Mg C ha⁻¹ y⁻¹, 37% of which was allocated below ground. Leaf fluxes were the greatest component of NPP and RECO. Ecosystem carbon-use efficiency (CUE = NPP/GPP) was 0.32 ± 0.04; low compared to many temperate broadleaved sites but close to values for old-growth sites. This may reflect the age of some trees, and/or the oceanic climate with relatively mild winters during which there can be substantial autotrophic maintenance respiration in winter but negligible growth. This study demonstrates that biometric measurements can provide robust estimates of site productivity and respiration and that eddy covariance and bottom-up measurements can be combined on seasonal and interannual timescales to enable a detailed understanding of the forest carbon cycle. |
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Bibliography: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10021-014-9793-1 ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 |
ISSN: | 1432-9840 1435-0629 |
DOI: | 10.1007/s10021-014-9793-1 |