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No recovery of soil respiration four years after fire and post-fire management in a Nordic boreal forest

Kelly, Julia LU ; Doerr, Stefan H. ; Ekroos, Johan LU ; Ibáñez, Theresa S. ; Islam, Md Rafikul LU orcid ; Santín, Cristina ; Soares, Margarida LU and Kljun, Natascha LU orcid (2025) In Agricultural and Forest Meteorology 364.
Abstract

The long-term carbon storage capacity of the boreal forest is under threat from the increasing frequency and intensity of wildfires. In addition to the direct carbon emissions during a fire, the burnt forest often turns into a net carbon emitter after fire, leading to large additional losses of carbon over several years. Understanding how quickly forests recover after a fire is therefore vital to predicting the effects of fire on the forest carbon balance. We present soil respiration and CH4 fluxes, soil chemistry, microclimate and vegetation survey data from the first four years after a wildfire in a Pinus sylvestris forest in Sweden. This is an understudied part of the boreal biome where forest management decisions interact... (More)

The long-term carbon storage capacity of the boreal forest is under threat from the increasing frequency and intensity of wildfires. In addition to the direct carbon emissions during a fire, the burnt forest often turns into a net carbon emitter after fire, leading to large additional losses of carbon over several years. Understanding how quickly forests recover after a fire is therefore vital to predicting the effects of fire on the forest carbon balance. We present soil respiration and CH4 fluxes, soil chemistry, microclimate and vegetation survey data from the first four years after a wildfire in a Pinus sylvestris forest in Sweden. This is an understudied part of the boreal biome where forest management decisions interact with disturbances to affect forest growth. We analysed how fire severity and post-fire salvage-logging affected soil carbon fluxes. The fire did not affect soil CH4 uptake. However, soil respiration was significantly affected by the presence or absence of living trees after the fire and post-fire forest management. Tree mortality due to the high-severity fire, or the salvage-logging of living trees after low-severity fire, led to immediate and significant decreases in soil respiration. Salvage-logging of dead trees after high-severity fire did not alter soil respiration compared to when the dead trees were left standing. However, it did significantly slow the regrowth of understory vegetation. Our results highlight that the impact of salvage-logging on the soil carbon fluxes depends on fire severity but that logging always slows the natural recovery of vegetation after fire. The soil CO2 fluxes did not show signs of recovery at any of the burnt sites during the first four years since the fire.

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author
; ; ; ; ; ; and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Boreal forest, Methane flux, Recovery, Salvage-logging, Soil respiration, Wildfire
in
Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
volume
364
article number
110454
publisher
Elsevier
external identifiers
  • scopus:85218238502
ISSN
0168-1923
DOI
10.1016/j.agrformet.2025.110454
project
2018 Wildfires: Forest Management Impact on Above- and Belowground Ecosystem Recovery
language
English
LU publication?
yes
additional info
Publisher Copyright: © 2025 The Author(s)
id
c880eb41-93e2-4753-95cc-49e021f9ac64
date added to LUP
2025-03-05 15:52:16
date last changed
2025-04-04 14:26:29
@article{c880eb41-93e2-4753-95cc-49e021f9ac64,
  abstract     = {{<p>The long-term carbon storage capacity of the boreal forest is under threat from the increasing frequency and intensity of wildfires. In addition to the direct carbon emissions during a fire, the burnt forest often turns into a net carbon emitter after fire, leading to large additional losses of carbon over several years. Understanding how quickly forests recover after a fire is therefore vital to predicting the effects of fire on the forest carbon balance. We present soil respiration and CH<sub>4</sub> fluxes, soil chemistry, microclimate and vegetation survey data from the first four years after a wildfire in a Pinus sylvestris forest in Sweden. This is an understudied part of the boreal biome where forest management decisions interact with disturbances to affect forest growth. We analysed how fire severity and post-fire salvage-logging affected soil carbon fluxes. The fire did not affect soil CH<sub>4</sub> uptake. However, soil respiration was significantly affected by the presence or absence of living trees after the fire and post-fire forest management. Tree mortality due to the high-severity fire, or the salvage-logging of living trees after low-severity fire, led to immediate and significant decreases in soil respiration. Salvage-logging of dead trees after high-severity fire did not alter soil respiration compared to when the dead trees were left standing. However, it did significantly slow the regrowth of understory vegetation. Our results highlight that the impact of salvage-logging on the soil carbon fluxes depends on fire severity but that logging always slows the natural recovery of vegetation after fire. The soil CO<sub>2</sub> fluxes did not show signs of recovery at any of the burnt sites during the first four years since the fire.</p>}},
  author       = {{Kelly, Julia and Doerr, Stefan H. and Ekroos, Johan and Ibáñez, Theresa S. and Islam, Md Rafikul and Santín, Cristina and Soares, Margarida and Kljun, Natascha}},
  issn         = {{0168-1923}},
  keywords     = {{Boreal forest; Methane flux; Recovery; Salvage-logging; Soil respiration; Wildfire}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{04}},
  publisher    = {{Elsevier}},
  series       = {{Agricultural and Forest Meteorology}},
  title        = {{No recovery of soil respiration four years after fire and post-fire management in a Nordic boreal forest}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.agrformet.2025.110454}},
  doi          = {{10.1016/j.agrformet.2025.110454}},
  volume       = {{364}},
  year         = {{2025}},
}