Bedrock composition can play a critical role in determining the structure and water demand of forests, influencing their vulnerability to drought. The properties of bedrock can help explain within-region patterns of tree mortality in the 2011–2017 California drought.
Montane forests are iconic natural resources that provide habitat, carbon sequestration, regulation of water, and, for many cultures, profound meaning. A warming climate and prolonged droughts threaten these forests, as shown by the 2011–2017 drought in California, USA, which killed over 140 million trees. However, the vulnerability of forests to climate-driven risks is not evenly distributed across these landscapes. In the 2011–2017 drought, some contiguous forested areas (or forest stands) suffered more than 70% mortality while forests in other locations experienced few or no losses1. Understanding these spatial patterns is critical for the projection of future risks and for targeted forest management. Writing in Nature Geoscience, Callahan and colleagues look beneath the surface at the composition of bedrock and find a link to these patterns of drought mortality in the California Sierra2.
Source: Ecology - nature.com
