Where are the Sierra Nevada’s large trees and can they persist?
/Identification and conservation of mature and old-growth forests has become a federal government priority. In California’s Sierra Nevada’s most of the remaining large trees are concentrated on Forest Service and National Park Service lands. We used airborne lidar data to census large (≥30” diameter at breast height (DBH)) and very large (≥40”) trees across three large Sierra landscapes. We found that large trees are either locally absent to rare or are aggregated in stands with 8-20 large trees per acre.
Kane, V.R., Bartl-Geller, B.N., Cova, G.R., Chamberlain, C.P., van Wagtendonk, L., North, M.P. 2023. Where are the large trees? A census of Sierra Nevada large trees to determine their frequency and spatial distribution across three large landscapes. Forest Ecology and Management. Volume 546,2023,121351. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foreco.2023.121351
