Tree species mixing as a strategy for adaptation to climate change

BC3 Seminars
“Tree species mixing as a strategy for adaptation to climate change“

Prof.  Miren del Río Gaztelurrutia

Instituto de Ciencias Forestales (ICIFOR), INIA-CSIC

Abstract:

Forest ecosystems are more and more threaten by the increasing biotic and abiotic disturbances triggered by global change. Adapting forest systems to climate change while maintaining their mitigation capacity is the main challenge to achieve a climate smart forestry. One of the management strategies that can enhance forest adaptation is to promote mixed species forests. Increasing species diversity may improve forest ecosystem functioning, with numerous evidences that mixed forests can be more productive, stable, and supply a better provision of ecosystem services. Recent studies also highlight that the species composition (i.e. species identities) is often more important for forest functioning than species diversity, pointing to the need to consider functional and phylogenetic diversities.

Under this framework, to what extent positive species diversity on ecosystem functioning starts as soon as two tree species are mixed is of great relevance to forest management given that (i) there are already large areas of mixed forests composed of two species; (ii) from a management perspective, transition from monospecific to two-species mixed forests is often a more realistic option than direct conversion to multispecies forests. In this presentation, the potential benefits of mixing two species are discussed by summarizing some findings on species interactions in different two-species mixtures across Europe (conifer-broadleaved and conifer-conifer mixtures). The main approach is the comparison of the two-species mixture with the corresponding monospecific stands. First, some results on tree and stand level yield components are presented. Secondly, different responses to some biotic and abiotic factors in mixtures are introduced. Finally, some general recommendations for managing and promoting mixed stands in the context of climate change are presented.

About the Lecturer

Prof. Miren del Río is a researcher at the Institute of Forest Sciences (INIA-CSIC) in Madrid. Her research activity focuses on forest dynamics and management, with special interest on mixed forests and on silviculture as a tool for forest adaptation and mitigation. She significantly contributed to the outstanding increase of knowledge on mixed forest dynamics and management during the last decade, with numerous publications and coordinating an EU project on risk-resilient management in mixed forests. She has published more than 100 papers in scientific international journals (SCI), 16 chapters in international scientific books and co-edited an international book on mixed forests. In addition, she has published 13 handbooks and chapter of books oriented to forest practice. She has supervised 10 PhD Thesis and one more is in progress. She taught silviculture during four years at the University of Valladolid and since then she is involved in teaching, currently in an international master at the same university. She was member of the steering committee of the Spanish Forest Science Society (SECF) from 2013 to 2022 and currently is deputy of the IUFRO research group RG1.09 on Ecology and Silviculture of Mixed Forests.