Land-use change and windstorms legacies drove the recolonization dynamics of laurel forests in Tenerife, Canary islands

Laurel forests are quite relevant for biodiversity conservation and are among the island ecosystems most severely damaged by human activities.In the past,Canary laurel forests have been greatly altered by logging,livestock and agriculture.The remains of laurel forests are currently protected in the Canary Islands(Spain).However,we miss basic information needed for their restoration and adaptive management,such as tree longevity,growth potential and responsiveness to natural and anthropogenic disturbances.Using dendrochronological methods,we studied how forest dynamic is related to land-use change and windstorms in two well-preserved laurel forests on Tenerife Island.Wood cores were collected from over 80 trees per stand at three stands per forest.We used ring-width series to estimate tree ages and calculate annual basal area increments(BAI),cumulative diameter increases,and changes indicative of released and suppressed growth.Twelve tree species were found in all stands,with Laurus novocanariensis,Ilex canariensis and Morella faya being the most common species.Although some individuals were over 100 years old,61.8%-88.9% of the trees per stand established between 1940 and 1970,coinciding with a post-war period of land abandonment,rural exodus and the onset of a tourism economy.Some trees have shown growth rates larger than 1 cm diameter per year and most species have had increasing BAI trends over the past decades.Strong growth releases occurred after windstorms at both sites,but the effects of windstorms were site-dependent,with the 1958 storm affecting mainly the eastern tip of the island(Anaga massif)and the 1991 storm the western tip(Teno massif).Given the great ability of laurel forest trees to establish after land use cessation and to increase growth after local disturbances such as windstorms,passive restoration may be sufficient to regenerate this habitat in currently degraded areas.

Recent Near-surface Temperature Trends in the Antarctic Peninsula from Observed,Reanalysis and Regional Climate Model Data

This study investigates the recent near-surface temperature trends over the Antarctic Peninsula.We make use of available surface observations,ECMWF’s ERA5 and its predecessor ERA-Interim,as well as numerical simulations,allowing us to contrast different data sources.We use hindcast simulations performed with Polar-WRF over the Antarctic Peninsula on a nested domain configuration at 45 km(PWRF-45)and 15 km(PWRF-15)spatial resolutions for the period 1991?2015.In addition,we include hindcast simulations of KNMI-RACMO21P obtained from the CORDEX-Antarctica domain(~50 km)for further comparisons.Results show that there is a marked windward warming trend except during summer.This windward warming trend is particularly notable in the autumn season and likely to be associated with the recent deepening of the Amundsen/Bellingshausen Sea low and warm advection towards the Antarctic Peninsula.On the other hand,an overall summer cooling is characterized by the strengthening of the Weddell Sea low as well as an anticyclonic trend over the Amundsen Sea accompanied by northward winds.The persistent cooling trend observed at the Larsen Ice Shelf station is not captured by ERA-Interim,whereas hindcast simulations indicate that there is a clear pattern of windward warming and leeward cooling.Furthermore,larger temporal correlations and lower differences exhibited by PWRF-15 illustrate the existence of the added value in the higher spatial resolution simulation.