I'm trying to develop biomass growth model of forest. Does anybody know that forest biomass will be back to initial value after the disturbance (logging, fire)?what the reference related with this?thanks
In our research (middle taiga forest, Siberia) we found that after logging and fires the esosystem can back to initial value but it takes more time than for ecosystems without any influence.
This is a tough question ... first of all, the forest type is an important aspect to consider! Another one is, not only the absolute value of biomass, but also how stable it is during further succession. For south-east Atlantic Rainforest stands I can say, that secondary growth can recover in terms of biomass pretty fast - but this is not necessarily stable: e.g. fast growing species might increase biomass fast, but after species-turnover to mid-term/late successional species this might temporarily decrease again. Also the type of disturbance might be crucial: we found in one study that regrowth after complete cut-down recovered faster in terms of biomass than selectivily logged forest ... it's challenging to develop models for this, especially general ones - good luck!
I agree with Andre that this will be a very site and disturbance specific question. Just to add some more detail, if you are comparing logging vs. a fire those will be totally different, because a fire will add a huge flush of nutrients to the system, while logging removes most of those nutrients. Then the type of soil will be important...will it hold those nutrients or will they all be leeched out? Then the type of plant growth is important...will they grow fast enough to recapture the nutrients, or will they be leeched out of the system? The type of forest will be very important. In Hawaii a wet forest can most recuperate within 30 years, but a dry forest will only be partially recuperated after 300 years. People might be able to provide insights if you give more detail about your study system. If you are going to make a generalized model they I would suggest starting with several site specific models, and attempting to create equations linking the models by altering the key parameters (ie. rainfall, soil type, dominant canopy species, etc).
Thanks Anastasia Makhnykina, Andre Lindner, Noa Lincoln for your comment and suggestion, I agree that the forest after disturbance can recover in term biomass, the time to recover depends on type and severity of disturbance, forest type, site condition (rainfall, soil type, topografi, etc), thanks.
Such question depends very much on species composition linked to that to the forest ecosystem (nemoral, boreal....): For beech have a look at the new and interesting report: (Ukraine, Western Carpatians, Uholka) ukrainischen Westkarpaten (Uholka).