Succession écologique des forêts d'épinette blanche et fluctuations climatiques, Poste-de-la-Baleine, Nouveau-Québec

• Published in: Canadian Journal of Botany
• Main Author: Payette, Serge
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Canadian Science Publishing 1976
• Subjects: Plant Science; Baleine; Blanche; la Baleine; Poste-de-la-Baleine; Tundra
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1139/b76-152; http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/pdf/10.1139/b76-152

The stand structures of three white spruce (Picea glauca (Moench) Voss) climax forests of the hemiarctic zone in New Quebec are described. The forests have a similar structural pattern, characterized by important and irregular variations in the number of individuals per age, diameter, and height classes. These variations are synchronic and suggest that the climate strongly influences the forest regeneration. The discontinuous trend in the curves may possibly be related to changes in seed production and seedling establishment. Synchronism between the 300-year dendrochronological curve and the stand age-structure is apparent. The hollow parts of the age curves are related to unfavorable climatic periods and the peaks to favorable ones. These climatic fluctuations are probably responsible for either a decrease or an increase in white spruce seed production important to hemiarctic forest regeneration. Finally, the writer suggests a theoretical age-structure curve for climax forests in the maritime forest-tundra near Poste-de-la-Baleine, New Quebec.