Assisted migration to address climate change in forestry: validating habitat and growth projections

在大规模植树造林计划中，人工辅助物种种群的迁移可能是一种有效和具有成本效益的气候变化适应战略。加拿大的几个省级林业机构目前正在实施林业方面的协助移徙处方。然而，这种大规模的管理干预往往会带来意想不到的后果的风险，特别是在由不完美的模型和部分信息指导的情况下。该项目将填补科学知识空白，并开发可靠的建模技术，以便在这一关键时刻直接为种子转让政策的制定提供信息。 这项研究计划的中心思想是将北美树种引进欧洲作为试验台，以测试这些树种如何在新奇的气候环境下生长和生存。特别是锡特卡云杉和道格拉斯冷杉，几十年来一直在欧洲进行广泛的测试，并在许多被证明高产和有弹性的地方进行了商业种植。我们利用这个机会根据完全独立的数据验证我们的北美栖息地模型，并隐含地评估它们的现实性，以指导气候变化下的林业运营。 具体地说，我们将测试一种新的物种分布模型，该模型是为了指导加拿大西部重新造林的种植树种的选择而开发的。我们将把为锡特卡云杉和道格拉斯冷杉训练的模型应用于欧洲的种植环境，并根据欧洲种源试验(种子来源已知的20到80年的实验种植园)的数据来验证它的预测。还将对来自树木年轮数据的生长记录和来自10个欧洲国家的长达百年的森林调查记录进行额外的验证。

Human-aided movement of species populations in large-scale reforestation programs could be an effective and cost-efficient climate change adaptation strategy. Assisted migration prescriptions in forestry are currently being implemented by several Canadian provincial forestry agencies. Such large-scale management interventions, however, tend to entail the risks of unintended consequences, especially when guided by imperfect models and partial information. This project will fill scientific knowledge gaps and develop robust modeling techniques that can directly inform policy developments for seed transfer at this critical juncture. The central idea of this research program is to use introductions of North American tree species to Europe as a test bed for how these species may grow and survive under novel climatic environments. Especially Sitka spruce and Douglas-fir have been widely tested in Europe for decades, and are commercially planted in many locations where they proved productive and resilient. We use this opportunity to validate our North American habitat models against completely independent data, and by implication evaluate their realism to guide forestry operations under climate change. Specifically, we will test a new class of species distribution model, which was developed to guide choice of planting stock for reforestation in western Canada. We will apply the model trained for Sitka spruce and Douglas-fir to European planting environments, and validate its predictions against data from European provenance trials (20- to 80-year old experimental plantations with known origin of seed sources). Additional validations will be carried out against growth records from tree ring data and up to hundred years of forest inventory records from ten European countries.