Silvicultural regime shapes understory functional structure in European forests

Bibtex

@misc{00f5e233-4792-443e-9631-3dfa352aeac7,
title = "Silvicultural regime shapes understory functional structure in European forests",
abstract = "Abstract Managing forests to sustain their diversity and functioning is a major challenge in a changing world. Despite the key role of understory vegetation in driving forest biodiversity, regeneration and functioning, few studies address the functional dimensions of understory vegetation response to silvicultural management. We assessed the influence of the silvicultural regimes on the functional diversity and redundancy of European forest understory. We gathered vascular plant abundance data from more than 2000 plots in European forests, each associated with one out of the five most widespread silvicultural regimes. We used generalized linear mixed models to assess the effect of different silvicultural regimes on understory functional diversity (Rao's quadratic entropy) and functional redundancy, while accounting for climate and soil conditions, and explored the reciprocal relationship between three diversity components (functional diversity, redundancy and dominance) across silvicultural regimes through a ternary diversity diagram. Intensive silvicultural regimes are associated with a decrease in functional diversity and an increase in functional redundancy, compared with unmanaged conditions. This means that although intensive management may buffer communities' functions against species or functional losses, it also limits the range of understory response to environmental changes. Policy implications. Different silvicultural regimes influence different facets of understory functional features. While unmanaged forests can be used as a reference to design silvicultural practices in compliance with biodiversity conservation targets, different silvicultural options should be balanced at landscape scale to sustain the multiple forest functions that human societies are increasingly demanding.",
author = "Francesco Chianucci and Francesca Napoleone and Carlo Ricotta and Carlotta Ferrara and Lina Fusaro and Lorenzo Balducci and Giovanni Trentanovi and Owen Bradley and Bence Kovacs and Marco Mina and Bruno E. L. Cerabolini and Kris Vandekerkhove and Pallieter De Smedt and Luc Lens and Lionel R Hertzog and Kris Verheyen and Jeňýk Hofmeister and Jan Hošek and Radim Matula and Inken Doerfler and Jörg Müller and Wolfgang W. Weisser and Jan Helback and Peter Schall and Markus Fischer and Jacob Heilmann-Clausen and Rasmus Riis-Hansen and Irina Goldberg and Erik Aude and Sebastian Kepfer Rojas and Inger Kappel Schmidt and Torben Riis Nielsen and Anders Mårell and Yann Dumas and Philippe Janssen and Yoan Paillet and Frederic Archaux and Fotios Xystrakis and Flóra Tinya and Péter Ódor and Réka Aszalós and János Bölöni and Andrea Cutini and Simonetta Bagella and Tommaso Sitzia and Gediminas Brazaitis and Vitas Marozas and Mariana Ujházyová and Karol Ujházy and František Máliš and Björn Nordén and Sabina Burrascano",
year = "2024",
month = sep,
day = "02",
doi = "https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2664.14740",
language = "English",
publisher = "Wiley-Blackwell",
address = "Belgium,
type = "Other"
}

Authors

Francesco Chianucci
Francesca Napoleone
Carlo Ricotta
Carlotta Ferrara
Lina Fusaro
Lorenzo Balducci
Giovanni Trentanovi
Owen Bradley
Bence Kovacs
Marco Mina
Bruno E. L. Cerabolini
Kris Vandekerkhove
Pallieter De Smedt
Luc Lens
Lionel R Hertzog
Kris Verheyen
Jeňýk Hofmeister
Jan Hošek
Radim Matula
Inken Doerfler
Jörg Müller
Wolfgang W. Weisser
Jan Helback
Peter Schall
Markus Fischer
Jacob Heilmann-Clausen
Rasmus Riis-Hansen
Irina Goldberg
Erik Aude
Sebastian Kepfer Rojas
Inger Kappel Schmidt
Torben Riis Nielsen
Anders Mårell
Yann Dumas
Philippe Janssen
Yoan Paillet
Frederic Archaux
Fotios Xystrakis
Flóra Tinya
Péter Ódor
Réka Aszalós
János Bölöni
Andrea Cutini
Simonetta Bagella
Tommaso Sitzia
Gediminas Brazaitis
Vitas Marozas
Mariana Ujházyová
Karol Ujházy
František Máliš
Björn Nordén
Sabina Burrascano