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Climate change poses threats to forests, creating a need for
adaptation to novel and changing conditions. Although approaches for
adapting to climate change, such as the resistance, resilience, transition
(RRT) framework, are grounded in theory and management experience, little
is known about how these approaches may influence tree regeneration. To
address this gap, researchers at the University of Vermont and Dartmouth
examined five-year outcomes of treatments implemented using the RRT
framework at the Second College Grant site in northern New Hampshire as
part of the Adaptive Silviculture for
Climate Change network. All treatments in the study use
multi-aged regeneration methods with varying levels of canopy gap formation
and retention.
Researchers found that the seedling size class
differentially responded to the recent treatments while sapling composition
was associated with longer-term historic management in all treatments.
Treatments shifted regeneration composition toward desired future
conditions: Resistance helped regenerate species similar to the current
canopy composition, while Transition regeneration composition diverged from
the overstory with the highest proportion of shade-intolerant species.
Resilience included regeneration conditions found in both Resistance and
Transition. As a whole, regeneration profiles in response to each treatment
aligned well with RRT objectives, although changes were small in some cases
and it may require second, or even third, entries for stands to continue on
adaptation-oriented trajectories.
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