Do understory saplings respond to both light and below-ground competitio?: a field experiment in a north-eastern American hardwood forest and a literature review

Ricard, Jean-Pierre; Messier, Christian; Delagrange, Sylvain et Beaudet, Marilou (2003). « Do understory saplings respond to both light and below-ground competitio?: a field experiment in a north-eastern American hardwood forest and a literature review ». Annals of Forest Science, 60, pp. 749-756.

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Résumé

A study was initiated in 1993 to evaluate the potential effects of both above- and below-ground competition exclusion on yellow birch (Betula alleghaniensis Britton), sugar maple (Acer saccharum Marsh.) and American beech (Fagus grandifolia Ehrh.) sapling growth along an understory light gradient ranging from 3% to 50% of full sunlight. We compared four different growth variables between a control and a treatment (trenching and manual removal of nearby vegetation). Height growth, diameter growth, height over stem diameter ratio, and crown area varied with light availability in all three species, whereas trenching treatment had no significant effect. Our results show that light is the main factor affecting understory sapling growth following a selection cut in this northern hardwood forest, at least up to 50% full sunlight. The unresponsiveness of these three species to below-ground competition is discussed in relation to a literature review in which both soil richness and species functional ecology are considered.

Type:	Article de revue scientifique
Mots-clés ou Sujets:	understory, saplings, light, below-ground competition, hardwood forest, literature view, soil richness, species functional ecology
Unité d'appartenance:	Faculté des sciences > Département des sciences biologiques
Déposé par:	Christian Messier
Date de dépôt:	06 janv. 2009
Dernière modification:	01 nov. 2014 02:07
Adresse URL :	http://archipel.uqam.ca/id/eprint/1564

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