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‘Carbon stocks in a Scots pine afforestation under different thinning intensities management’

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Abstract

Thinning, as a forest management strategy, may contribute towards mitigating climate change, depending on its net effect on forest carbon (C) stocks. Although thinning provides off-site C storage (in the form of wood products) it is still not clear whether it results in an increase, a reduction or no change in on-site C storage. In this study we analyze the effect of thinning on C stocks in a long-term experiment. Different thinning intensities (moderate, heavy and unthinned) have been applied over the last 30 years in a Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) stand, with a thinning rotation period of 10 years. The main C compartments were analyzed: above and belowground tree biomass, deadwood, forest floor and upper 30-cm of the mineral soil and tree biomass removed in thinning treatments. The results revealed that unthinned stands had the highest C stocks with 315 Mg C ha−1, moderate thinning presented 304 Mg C ha−1 and heavy thinning 296 Mg C ha−1, with significant differences between unthinned and heavily thinned stands. These differences were mainly due to C stock in live biomass, which decreased with thinning intensity. However, soil C stocks, forest floor and mineral soil, were not influenced by thinning, all of the stands displaying very similar values 102–107 Mg C ha−1 for total soil; 15–19 Mg C ha−1 for forest floor; 87–88 Mg C ha−1 for mineral soil). These results highlight the sustainability of thinning treatments in terms of C stocks in this pinewood afforestation, and provide valuable information for forest management aimed at mitigating climate change.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank to Eduardo López-Senespleda, Gerardo Urchaga and Antonio Urchaga for the field support and the staff of the INIA-CIFOR soil laboratory (Salvador Sastre and Puri Pereira) for their assistance. We also thank to all people who maintained the long term trial of this study. Adam Collins carried out the English revision. This work has been partially funded by the projects AGL2011-29701-C02-00, AT010-007 and AT013-004. We are grateful to the two anonymous reviewers for the suggestions that improved the final version of the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Silviculture and Forest Management, INIA-CIFOR, Ctra. A Coruña km 7.5, 28040, Madrid, Spain

    Ricardo Ruiz-Peinado, Andres Bravo-Oviedo, Gregorio Montero & Miren del Río

  2. Sustainable Forest Management Research Institute, University of Valladolid- INIA, Valladolid, Spain

    Ricardo Ruiz-Peinado, Andres Bravo-Oviedo, Gregorio Montero & Miren del Río

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  1. Ricardo Ruiz-Peinado
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  2. Andres Bravo-Oviedo
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  3. Gregorio Montero
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  4. Miren del Río
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Correspondence to Ricardo Ruiz-Peinado.

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Ruiz-Peinado, R., Bravo-Oviedo, A., Montero, G. et al. ‘Carbon stocks in a Scots pine afforestation under different thinning intensities management’. Mitig Adapt Strateg Glob Change 21, 1059–1072 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11027-014-9585-0

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