Quantifying Peatland Ecohydrological Resilience to Drought

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Peatlands cover ~17% of Canada's land surface and are located primarily in the boreal and subarctic ecozones. Peatland ecosystems represent a global climate regulator and a regionally important water resource, containing one-third of the global soil carbon pool and accounting for 10% of the global surface fresh water. However, climate change is expected to lead to drier conditions, increased vegetation stress and a greater incidence of wildfire. While field evidence suggests that peatlands are generally resilient ecosystems, some modelling studies suggest peatlands will represent a strong and persistent positive feedback to drying under climate change. Consequently, there is an urgent need to develop and adopt a new approach to quantify ecohydrological processes in peatlands to determine their resilience to climate change mediated drought. As such, the aim of this research is to quantify peatland ecohydrological resilience to drought. Moss ecophysiology lab experiments will be complemented with a field based process quantification of peat resilience in response to varying severity of drought. A novel space for time approach will be used in this research by examining peat-filled wetlands ranging in depth (and successional state) from 0.1m to >2m. A mathematical model will be parameterized using the lab and field experiments used to simulate the effects of drought on peatland ecohydrology to assess peat depth thresholds to drought. This research will train and develop 12 highly qualified personnel including 2 MSc and 2 PhD students. The research will provide new information, enhanced models, guidelines, and recommendations that will help government and industry better understand the long-term ecological and hydrological ramifications of natural resource management decisions and responses to climate change of peatlands. The relationship between drought and climate change could have significant implications for forestry activities, wildfire community protection and carbon sequestration.