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Monitoring canopy recovery in a subtropical forest following a huge ice storm using hemispherical photography

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Abstract

We estimated canopy structure and transmitted radiation using hemispherical photography in four monitoring years (2008–2010, 2016) following the 2008 huge ice storm in a subtropical forest in south China, so as to assess changes in canopy biophysical parameters during forest recovery from natural disturbance. Significant decrease in canopy openness (CO), transmitted direct radiation (TransDir), and transmitted diffuse radiation (TransDif), as well as significant increase in leaf area index (LAI), were found in the disturbed forest stand in the subsequent years following the ice storm, indicating rapid canopy recovery. In contrast, these biophysical parameters of the undisturbed forest stand were quite stable during the monitoring years. The strength of relationships between CO and other canopy biophysical parameters decreased in the disturbed stand along the monitoring years. The disturbed stand had common slopes for the CO-TransDir and CO-TransDif models in the first two monitoring years, but different slopes for the CO-LAI model between the first and the subsequent monitoring years, while the undisturbed stand had common slopes for all the regression models in the first three monitoring years following the huge ice storm. These results showed that stronger correlations of LAI or TransDir with CO were characteristic of less complex canopies, such as those damaged by disturbance; the sensitivity of transmitted radiation in response to CO decreased with canopy recovery. Our findings demonstrated that forests with different canopy structure varied in biophysical parameters, which can be quantified by hemispherical photography.

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Acknowledgments

We thank Zhenkui Li for his help with plant identification during plot establishment and Yi Zhang for his participation in image acquisition in the 2016 monitoring year. We are very grateful to the staff of Chebaling National Nature Reserve for logistic support.

Funding

This research was funded by a grant for non-commercial forest research from the Forestry Department of Guangdong Province, China.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Forestry and Landscape Architecture, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, 510642, China

    Runxia Huang, Xiaorong Jia, Mingfeng Xu, Peiyun Xie & Zhiyao Su

  2. College of Agriculture, Guangdong Ocean University, Zhanjiang, 524088, China

    Yuduan Ou

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  1. Runxia Huang
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Correspondence to Zhiyao Su.

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Huang, R., Jia, X., Ou, Y. et al. Monitoring canopy recovery in a subtropical forest following a huge ice storm using hemispherical photography. Environ Monit Assess 191, 355 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-019-7500-6

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