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A quantitative assessment of rockfall influence on forest structure in the Swiss Alps / Christine Moos in European Journal of Forest Research, vol 140 n° 1 (February 2021)  

Public [article]  inEuropean Journal of Forest Research > vol 140 n° 1 (February 2021) . - pp 91 - 104 Titre : A quantitative assessment of rockfall influence on forest structure in the Swiss Alps Type de document : Article/Communication Auteurs : Christine Moos, Auteur ; Nora Khelidj, Auteur ; Antoine Guisan, Auteur ; et al., Auteur Année de publication : 2021 Article en page(s) : pp 91 - 104 Note générale : bibliographie Langues : Anglais (eng) Descripteur : [Vedettes matières IGN] Végétation [Termes IGN] Alpes [Termes IGN] croissance végétale [Termes IGN] diamètre à hauteur de poitrine [Termes IGN] dynamique de la végétation [Termes IGN] éboulement [Termes IGN] modèle de simulation [Termes IGN] structure d'un peuplement forestier [Termes IGN] Suisse Résumé : (auteur) Forests below rocky cliffs often play a very important role in protecting settlements against rockfall. The structure and development of these forests are expected to be substantially affected by the disturbance of the falling rocks. Knowing about this effect is important to predict the development of protection forests and consider potential effects of the falling blocks in management strategies. The goal of this study is to quantify differences in forest structure depending on rockfall activity in four different sites in the Swiss Alps. For this, we collected data on forest structure in zones of different rockfall activity and derived rockfall impact probabilities based on rockfall simulations. We assessed whether differences in forest structure and signs of rockfall disturbance could be observed between the rockfall zones. We additionally built mixed-effects models to identify the key variables explaining the forest characteristics described by diameter (DBH) and basal area (bA). The forest structure differs between the rockfall zones, however, with varying effects amongst the sites. DBH tends to decrease with increasing rockfall activity, whereas tree density appears to be little impacted by rockfall. For most sites, the number of deposited blocks and the simulated tree impact probability have a significant effect in the models along with the species, whereas for one site, hardly any effect of rockfall was found. Our results, obtained either from direct measurements or modelling, show that rockfall can locally influence the structure of forests, whereas the influence depends on the frequency and intensity of the rockfall disturbance. Impact probabilities obtained by simulations can serve as a good proxy for rockfall disturbances. Numéro de notice : A2021-256 Affiliation des auteurs : non IGN Thématique : FORET Nature : Article nature-HAL : ArtAvecCL-RevueIntern DOI : 10.1007/s10342-020-01317-0 Date de publication en ligne : 18/09/2020 En ligne : https://doi.org/10.1007/s10342-020-01317-0 Format de la ressource électronique : url article Permalink : https://documentation.ensg.eu/index.php?lvl=notice_display&id=97290 [article]