Expansion of subalpine woody vegetation over 40 years on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada
Climate change is leading to the global loss of open montane meadows by facilitating tree and shrub encroachment at high elevations. North America’s coastal mountains are particularly vulnerable to these changes, as they are relatively low elevation compared with interior mountains and contain only...
Published in: | Canadian Journal of Forest Research |
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2016
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crcansciencepubl:10.1139/cjfr-2015-0186 2024-09-30T14:45:18+00:00 Expansion of subalpine woody vegetation over 40 years on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada Jackson, Michelle M. Topp, Emmeline Gergel, Sarah E. Martin, Kathy Pirotti, Francesco Sitzia, Tommaso 2016 http://dx.doi.org/10.1139/cjfr-2015-0186 http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/full-xml/10.1139/cjfr-2015-0186 http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/pdf/10.1139/cjfr-2015-0186 en eng Canadian Science Publishing http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/page/about/CorporateTextAndDataMining Canadian Journal of Forest Research volume 46, issue 3, page 437-443 ISSN 0045-5067 1208-6037 journal-article 2016 crcansciencepubl https://doi.org/10.1139/cjfr-2015-0186 2024-09-19T04:09:48Z Climate change is leading to the global loss of open montane meadows by facilitating tree and shrub encroachment at high elevations. North America’s coastal mountains are particularly vulnerable to these changes, as they are relatively low elevation compared with interior mountains and contain only small areas of alpine tundra. We compared aerial photographs from 1962 with those from 2005 covering three subalpine regions on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, to document the extent of changes in woody vegetation and investigate associations between vegetation change and topography. Mean proportional woody vegetation cover increased significantly from 0.75±0.03 to 0.81±0.03 between 1962 and 2005 (p < 0.0001). Relative increase in woody vegetation cover was greater at higher elevations and on northerly aspects. These findings confirm an upward expansion and infilling of trees and shrubs and a reduction of the area encompassed by open alpine tundra on Vancouver Island. Loss of open meadow conditions at high elevations in this region will likely have consequences for alpine plant and animal communities. Article in Journal/Newspaper Tundra Canadian Science Publishing British Columbia ENVELOPE(-125.003,-125.003,54.000,54.000) Canada Canadian Journal of Forest Research 46 3 437 443 |
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Open Polar |
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Canadian Science Publishing |
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crcansciencepubl |
language |
English |
description |
Climate change is leading to the global loss of open montane meadows by facilitating tree and shrub encroachment at high elevations. North America’s coastal mountains are particularly vulnerable to these changes, as they are relatively low elevation compared with interior mountains and contain only small areas of alpine tundra. We compared aerial photographs from 1962 with those from 2005 covering three subalpine regions on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, to document the extent of changes in woody vegetation and investigate associations between vegetation change and topography. Mean proportional woody vegetation cover increased significantly from 0.75±0.03 to 0.81±0.03 between 1962 and 2005 (p < 0.0001). Relative increase in woody vegetation cover was greater at higher elevations and on northerly aspects. These findings confirm an upward expansion and infilling of trees and shrubs and a reduction of the area encompassed by open alpine tundra on Vancouver Island. Loss of open meadow conditions at high elevations in this region will likely have consequences for alpine plant and animal communities. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Jackson, Michelle M. Topp, Emmeline Gergel, Sarah E. Martin, Kathy Pirotti, Francesco Sitzia, Tommaso |
spellingShingle |
Jackson, Michelle M. Topp, Emmeline Gergel, Sarah E. Martin, Kathy Pirotti, Francesco Sitzia, Tommaso Expansion of subalpine woody vegetation over 40 years on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada |
author_facet |
Jackson, Michelle M. Topp, Emmeline Gergel, Sarah E. Martin, Kathy Pirotti, Francesco Sitzia, Tommaso |
author_sort |
Jackson, Michelle M. |
title |
Expansion of subalpine woody vegetation over 40 years on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada |
title_short |
Expansion of subalpine woody vegetation over 40 years on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada |
title_full |
Expansion of subalpine woody vegetation over 40 years on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada |
title_fullStr |
Expansion of subalpine woody vegetation over 40 years on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada |
title_full_unstemmed |
Expansion of subalpine woody vegetation over 40 years on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada |
title_sort |
expansion of subalpine woody vegetation over 40 years on vancouver island, british columbia, canada |
publisher |
Canadian Science Publishing |
publishDate |
2016 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1139/cjfr-2015-0186 http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/full-xml/10.1139/cjfr-2015-0186 http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/pdf/10.1139/cjfr-2015-0186 |
long_lat |
ENVELOPE(-125.003,-125.003,54.000,54.000) |
geographic |
British Columbia Canada |
geographic_facet |
British Columbia Canada |
genre |
Tundra |
genre_facet |
Tundra |
op_source |
Canadian Journal of Forest Research volume 46, issue 3, page 437-443 ISSN 0045-5067 1208-6037 |
op_rights |
http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/page/about/CorporateTextAndDataMining |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1139/cjfr-2015-0186 |
container_title |
Canadian Journal of Forest Research |
container_volume |
46 |
container_issue |
3 |
container_start_page |
437 |
op_container_end_page |
443 |
_version_ |
1811646053798117376 |