An important aim in forest-ecosystem investigation is to analyse the development of forest damages and to quantify changes in the damage-states over time of individual trees by influential factors. In addition to the ordinal measurement in such longitudinal studies one has to consider spatial correlations of the trees within an ecosystem. We present a practical method to include such dependency...

The focus of this paper is on how to assess ecosystem services in complex agroforestry systems using a case of edible forest gardens. Benefits of doing these assessments in a participatory learning and action research (PLAR) context are elaborated, as well as difficulties and questions that this has raised. The PLAR group comprised farmers on 13 smallholdings, researchers and a facilitator, whi...

A strategy for management of giant sequoia groves is formulated using a conceptual framework for ecosystem management recently developed by Region Five of the USDA Forest Service. The framework includes physical, biological, and social dimensions. Environmental indicators and reference variability for key ecosystem elements are discussed in this paper. The selected ecosystem elements include: 1...

-This paper presents an overview of the Forest Health Monitoring Program (FHM), a partnership among the USDA Forest Service, State Foresters, universities, and the USDI Bureau of Land Management. The purpose of FHM is to annually assess the condit ion of the nation’s forested ecosystems in a standardized way. There are four components of the program-Detection Monitoring, Evaluation Monitoring, ...

Predicting the long-term dynamics of forest systems depends on understanding multiple processes that often operate at vastly different scales. Disturbance and seed dispersal are landscape-scale phenomena and are spatially linked across the landscape. Ecosystem processes (e.g., growth and decomposition) have high annual and inter-specific variation and are generally quantified at the scale of a ...

Many authors have pointed out the need to firm up the ‘fuzzy’ ecosystem management paradigm and develop operationally practical processes to allow forest managers to accommodate more effectively the continuing rapid change in societal perspectives and goals. There are three spatial scales where clear, precise, practical ecosystem management processes are needed: the regional assessment scale, t...

The watershed services provided by tropical natural and planted forests are critical to human well-being. An increasing number of valuation studies and experiences with payment for ecosystem services have dealt with the role of ecosystems in regulating the flow of water. However, several studies have been based on misconceptions about the role of forests and plantations in the hydrological cycl...

A critical understanding of the scientific evidence that we have about the effects of tree species diversity on ecosystem properties and processes is required to guide practical forest management as well as future research. However, current understanding is limited by the lack of an appropriate framework for evaluating the reported evidence. In this chapter we outline how research on mixed-spec...

[1] We analyzed measurements of net ecosystem exchange of CO2 (NEE) over 15 European forests (the EuroFlux data set) to investigate which climate and forest characteristics explain temporal and intersite variations in NEE and its components, gross primary production (GPP) and respiration (R). Informed stepwise regression was used to derive a parameter-efficient, empirical model that was consist...

Payments for ecosystem services offer the potential to financially benefit landowners in exchange for active forest management. Given their nontimber focus, such payments might be particularly attractive to those owners who do not participate in typical forestry programs. To investigate, we surveyed “nonparticipating” Wisconsin landowners to assess their interest in possible payments for ecosys...