Land managers are adapting management strategies to position the forested landscape into one that will be resilient in Minnesota's changing climate. Trends in climate data have shown that Minnesota is getting warmer and wetter, please view the DNR's climate trends webpage for more information. Differences among the 52 forested NPCs are related very much to water availability for trees and understory plants. Forested communities have different capacities for interception, infiltration, storage, and runoff, thus we expect them to react differently to changes in the hydrologic regime -- whatever that may be.
Climate change considerations for forest management can be thought of as a 'funnel' that guides a landowner to make decisions at a successively narrower spatial extent from landscape, to region, then site. The land manager must evaluate information for an entire ecosystem (e.g., hydrology, soils, and forest health) and how manipulations to that ecosystem may be reflected in the tree species present. Generally, the goal is to select tree species that will be resilient to the changing climate and survive through a full stand rotation.
The widest part of the funnel is the landscape-level, here we keep in mind the full suite of species that currently exist in the forested landscape, those that may arrive, and those who's importance across the landscape may decrease. To understand climate change at this broad level read the Minnesota Forest Ecosystem Vulnerability Assessment and Synthesis, where you will learn about how a warmer and wetter climate will impact ecosystem functions and operability concerns (e.g., frozen ground conditions, length of growing season, and prevalence of drought).
The middle part of the funnel is the region-level. At this stage of climate change analysis researchers have defined changes land managers can assess for System Groups (i.e. forest types), instead of impacts to forests as a whole. The Climate Change Field Guide for Northern Minnesota Forests highlights how changes in precipitation and temperature may result in ecosystem changes such as hydrology modifications, increase/decrease in frost days, and drought stress, and apply those concepts to the species adapted to our System Groups. Regionally, land managers can also start brainstorming how the System characteristics may make it well suited for adaptation or vulnerable to climate stressors. Please view the Site-level Considerations for the six main forested systems in the Climate Change Field Guide for Northern Minnesota Forests publication to gain knowledge about site characteristics that would increase or decrease climate risk.
The smallest spatial extent a land manager must think about for climate change is the site-level. Here users must apply the regional Site-level Considerations with the conditions currently found on site. The land manager should assess the climate change risk and how a prescription may be modified in order to favor or disfavor certain tree species. The information provided below is our analysis of the competitive advantage a single species has within a community if the integrity of the community is expected to be maintained into the future. Overall, some of the species we present having a higher heat/moisture tolerance within the community may well be expected to diminish in habitat suitability across the region due to climate change. The species listed also do not represent any tree species changes as forests adapt through time.
It is important to remember that individual site conditions will vary and opportunities to create resilient forests will be a site-by-site analysis. Overall, keeping the full complement of suitable trees on-site is a good hedge against future climate uncertainty.
- Learn more about tree response to climate change
Incorporating climate change information into a site prescription can be a complicated web of understanding information at multiple scales. Most climate change prediction data answers questions about how a tree species will perform across a broad heterogeneous landscape, but decisions about species risk need to be made for individual sites. The following guides in the Learn More expansion provide useful information about vulnerabilities across forested-Minnesota. Please pay close attention to the Climate Change Field Guide as it highlights System Group-specific information and site-level considerations for each NPC System within the Laurentian Mixed Forest Province. Lastly, tree species concerns are neatly explained in the Northwoods Tree Handouts. All of these resources together can help a forester develop the desired future conditions for a forest.
Synecological score calculations
An analysis of habitat range climate data was used to assign and adjust synecological scores for our plants with regard to moisture (M) and temperature (H). The scores range from 1 (dry/cool) to 5 (wet/warm). The difference between a plant's individual synecological score and the mean synecological score of its community provides some insight as to whether that plant would benefit or suffer should its local environment become warmer or wetter.Example: For each of the 256 MHn35 vegetation plots, the M score of all component plants was summed and averaged to yield a score for each plot. Then the plot scores were summed and averaged to yield an M score for the community, which in this case was 2.3. The adjusted M score for basswood is 2.01, which is drier than 2.3. Thus, we assume that basswood would benefit from a slightly drier conditions. Similarly, the H score for basswood is 4.03, which is substantially warmer than the 2.9 mean for the MHn35 community, which suggests basswood would greatly benefit if MHn35 sites get warmer.
For more information about synecological scores, please view the following references:
Bakuzis, E.V. and Kurmis, V. 1978. Provisional list of synecological coordinates and selected ecographs of forest and other plant species in Minnesota. Staff Series Paper 5. Department of Forest Resources, University of Minnesota. St. Paul, MN.
Brand, G.J., and Almendinger, J.C. 1992. Synecological coordinates as indicators of variation in red pine productivity among TWINSPAN classes: A case Study. Research Paper NC-310. North Central Forest Experiment Station, U.S. Department of Agriculture, St. Paul, MN.For information about regional forest vulnerability, please view Minnesota Forest Ecosystem Vulnerability Assessment and Synthesis:
Handler, Stephen; Duveneck, Matthew J.; Iverson, Louis; Peters, Emily; Scheller, Robert M.; Wythers, Kirk R.; Brandt, Leslie; Butler, Patricia; Janowiak, Maria; Shannon, P. Danielle; Swanston, Chris; Barrett, Kelly; Kolka, Randy; McQuiston, Casey; Palik, Brian; Reich, Peter B.; Turner, Clarence; White, Mark; Adams, Cheryl; D'Amato, Anthony; Hagell, Suzanne; Johnson, Patricia; Johnson, Rosemary; Larson, Mike; Matthews, Stephen; Montgomery, Rebecca; Olson, Steve; Peters, Matthew; Prasad, Anantha; Rajala, Jack; Daley, Jad; Davenport, Mae; Emery, Marla R.; Fehringer, David; Hoving, Christopher L.; Johnson, Gary; Johnson, Lucinda; Neitzel, David; Rissman, Adena; Rittenhouse, Chadwick; Ziel, Robert. 2014. Minnesota forest ecosystem vulnerability assessment and synthesis: a report from the Northwoods Climate Change Response Framework project. Gen. Tech. Rep. NRS-133. Newtown Square, PA; U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Northern Research Station. 228 p.
Available online at https://www.fs.usda.gov/nrs/pubs/gtr/gtr_nrs133.pdfFor information about site-level considerations and vulnerabilities for NPC System Groups, please view the Climate Change Field Guide for Northern Minnesota Forests:
Handler, S., K. Marcinkowski, M. Janowiak, and C. Swanston. 2017. Climate change field guide for northern Minnesota forests: Site-level considerations and adaptation. USDA Northern Forests Climate Hub Technical Report #2. University of Minnesota College of Food, Agricultural, and Natural Resource Sciences, St. Paul, MN. 88p. Available at www.forestadaptation.org/MN_field_guideIndividual tree species adaptation characteristics and climate change projections across subsection-level areas can be found here:
https://forestadaptation.org/learn/resource-finder/climate-change-projections-tree-species-northwoods-mn-wi-mi