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Figure 1data_Exp 2Figure 1 data: Condition of experimental seedlings in hummocks with contrasting shrub density and tree canopy in Experiment 2: No Trees - Low Shrub biomass (NTLS), No Trees - High Shrub biomass (NTHS), Present Trees - Low Shrub biomass (PTLS) and Present Trees - High shrub biomass (PTHS) during the warmest growing season (2011) and at the end of the experiment (2013). Seedling condition was defined as: healthy (< 50% of the needles turned yellow or brown) or unhealthy (> 50% of the needles turned yellow or brown). Seedlings were 1 month old at plantation time in the July 2010.Table 1_environmental conditions_Exp 1Table 1 data: Environmental conditions and vegetation characteristics in hummocks (circular and bands) and lawns for Experiment 1. Water table depth below surface is an average for the four growing seasons (2010-2013)Table 2_ photosynthesis data_Exp 1Table 2 photosynthesis data: Photosynthesis rates for experimental pine seedlings in hummocks (circular and bands) versus adjacent lawns for Experiment 1.Table 2_seedling responses_Exp 1Table 2 data: Responses of experimental pine seedlings in hummocks (circular and bands) versus adjacent lawns for Experiment 1 after 4 growing seasons. ST: Seeds inserted on top of moss; SB: Seeds inserted below moss; Small seedling (1 month old at plantation time); Large seedling (2 months old at plantation time). Emergence = % of planted seeds emerged after 1 year. Condition = % healthy seedlings. Stem growth corresponds to vertical stem growth for germinating (ST and SB) seedlings and new stem growth for older (small and large) seedlings.Table 3_regression seedling-environment_Exp 1Table 3 data for generalized linear models assessing the responses of experimental pine seedlings in hummocks (circular and bands) and adjacent lawns for Experiment 1 during the whole experimental period (2010-2013). ST: Seedlings from seeds inserted on top of moss; SB: Seedlings from seeds inserted below moss; Small seedling (1 month old at plantation time); Large seedling (2 months old at plantation time). Condition = % healthy seedlings. Growth = stem growth.Table 4_Environmental data_Exp 2Table 4: Environmental conditions in hummocks with contrasting shrub density and tree canopy in Experiment 2: No Trees - Low Shrub biomass (NTLS), No Trees - High Shrub biomass (NTHS), Present Trees - Low Shrub biomass (PTLS) and Present Trees - High shrub biomass (PTHS).Table 4 and Table S5a_seedling performance_Exp 2Table 4: Seedling performance in hummocks with contrasting shrub density and tree canopy in Experiment 2: No Trees - Low Shrub biomass (NTLS), No Trees - High Shrub biomass (NTHS), Present Trees - Low Shrub biomass (PTLS) and Present Trees - High shrub biomass (PTHS). Seedling emergence, condition and survival from seeds inserted below the moss (SB), and from small planted seedlings.Table S3_cox regression (survival analysis)_Exp 1Table S3: Data for Cox survival analysis for experimental pine seedlings in hummocks (circular and bands) versus adjacent lawns during 2010-2013. ST: Seedlings from seeds inserted on top of moss; SB: Seedlings from seeds inserted below moss; Small seedling (1 month old, 10 cm tall at plantation time); Large seedling (2 months old, 30 cm tall at plantation time).Table S4_ regression seedling-environment 2011_Exp 1Table S4: Data for generalized linear models assessing the responses of experimental pine seedlings in hummocks (circular and bands) and adjacent lawns for Experiment 1 in 2011. Small seedling (1 month old, 10 cm tall at plantation time); Large seedling (2 months old, 30 cm tall at plantation time). Condition = % healthy seedlings. Growth = stem growth. Boreal ecosystems are warming roughly twice as fast as the global average, resulting in woody expansion that could further speed up the climate warming. Boreal peatbogs are waterlogged systems that store more than 30% of the global soil carbon. Facilitative effects of shrubs and trees on the establishment of new individuals could increase tree cover with profound consequences for the structure and functioning of boreal peatbogs, carbon sequestration and climate. We conducted two field experiments in boreal peatbogs to assess the mechanisms that explain tree seedling recruitment and to estimate the strength of positive feedbacks between shrubs and trees. We planted seeds and seedlings of Pinus sylvestris in microsites with contrasting water-tables and woody cover and manipulated both shrub canopy and root competition. We monitored seedling emergence, growth and survival for up to four growing seasons and assessed how seedling responses related to abiotic and biotic conditions. We found that tree recruitment is more successful in drier topographical microsites with deeper water-tables. On these hummocks, shrubs have both positive and negative effects on tree seedling establishment. Shrub cover improved tree seedling condition, growth and survival during the warmest growing season. In turn, higher tree basal area correlates positively with soil nutrient availability, shrub biomass and abundance of tree juveniles. Synthesis. Our results suggest that shrubs facilitate tree colonization of peatbogs which further increases shrub growth. These facilitative effects seem to be stronger under warmer conditions suggesting that a higher frequency of warmer and dry summers may lead to stronger positive interactions between shrubs and trees that could eventually facilitate a shift from moss to tree-dominated systems.

Research data and scientific software related to spatio-temporal estimations of ecological soil moisture with available data covering the whole territory of Germany and the Kellerwald National Park (Hesse). Temporal trends of modelled soil moisture for the time period 1961–2070 were statistically analyzed. Soil moisture changes (drying-out) at both national and regional levels were mapped. {"references": ["Nickel S, Schr\u00f6der W 2017. Fuzzy modelling and mapping soil moisture for observed and future periods. An alternative for dynamic modelling at the national and regional scale? Annals of Forest Science 74:71"]}

Background: The global palm oil market experienced a remarkable boom since the year 2000. Since palm oil can be used for biodiesel production, the global expansion of oil palm cultivation has been associated with the global biofuel boom. Biofuel policies—especially those adopted in the European Union (EU)—have been blamed for the socio-environmental impacts of oil palm expansion. We explore how the global biofuel boom interacts with national geographies and social-economic and political processes to produce country-specific trajectories of biofuel crops expansion. We analyse the expansion of oil palm cultivation in Colombia between 2000 and 2010 from a political ecology perspective. Methods: The analysis is based on a framework that positions expansion of commodity frontiers within the ‘space-of-flows’ and the ‘space-of-place’. Through this approach, we identify the markets and geographies that define the country-specific trajectories of expansion of oil palm in Colombia, and their connections with general patterns of land control. The empirical analysis is based on primary data collected during fieldwork, and on an extensive review of secondary data about the palm oil sector and the socio-environmental effects of oil palm expansion in the country. Results: The contemporary oil palm expansion in Colombia was not specifically influenced by the international biofuel market. Expansion was characterized by an increasing production of palm oil for biodiesel, to supply a policy-driven national biofuel market controlled by national palm oil producers. The evidence shows that this oil palm expansion proceeded through a variety of land control practices that constitute forms of ‘accumulation by dispossession’ and ‘assimilation’. These are embedded in contextual factors that include the agrarian history of Colombia, the armed conflict, and government policies. Conclusions: Our study shows that the ways in which expansion of biofuel crops unfold in each producing country depend not only on the global biofuel market. They are also shaped by the country-specific geographies and political economies. Therefore, research and policies on the global expansion of energy crops should account for the complex and interrelated factors that mediate the specific ways in which the global demand for biofuels creates biofuel crop booms at country level.

In Cameroon, as in other countries of the Congo basin region, policy processes and activities related to climate change have been hitherto geared mostly towards mitigation and related questions, with limited concern about adaptation issues. However, the increasing vulnerability of Cameroon to climate variability and change makes adaptation significant to its national climate-change policy. Nonetheless, it remains a challenge to make both adaptation and mitigation occupy the same policy space in Cameroon. This paper builds partly on studies carried out in two community forest carbon initiatives in the southern rainforest of Cameroon. It also argues, supported by existing literature on adaptation and mitigation, that mitigation activities have the potential to produce adaptation outcomes; a situation which avoids duplication of efforts and waste of financial and technical resources, if synergetic options are anticipated and planned. However, whether such integrated approaches succeed and are subsequently reflected in national-level climate policy depends on how actors across different sectors and at different levels engage and carry out their roles. The paper discusses these roles and how they can support each other in pursuing integrated initiatives – a context which is vital for Cameroon.

Earth’s rapidly changing climate is particularly evident in the Arctic. Outside of the Arctic, the emergence of large-sample catchment databases has transformed science from an emphasis on local case-studies towards more systematic insights into drivers of watershed functioning. Here we present an integrated pan-ARctic CAtchments summary DatabasE (ARCADE) of >40,000 catchments, including small and medium-sized watersheds, draining into the Arctic Ocean. These watersheds, delineated at a high-resolution (90 m), are provided with 103 geospatial, environmental, climatic, and physiographic catchment properties. ARCADE is the first aggregated database of pan-Arctic river catchments that includes small watersheds at a high resolution. These small catchments are experiencing the greatest climatic warming while also storing large quantities of soil carbon in landscapes that are especially prone to degradation of permafrost (i.e., ice wedge polygon terrain) and associated hydrological regime shifts. The publication of this database is a necessary step toward more integrated monitoring of the pan-Arctic watershed.

Abstract. Regional land carbon budgets provide insights on the spatial distribution of the land uptake of atmospheric carbon dioxide, and can be used to evaluate carbon cycle models and to define baselines for land-based additional mitigation efforts. The scientific community has been involved in providing observation-based estimates of regional carbon budgets either by downscaling atmospheric CO2 observations into surface fluxes with atmospheric inversions, by using inventories of carbon stock changes in terrestrial ecosystems, by upscaling local field observations such as flux towers with gridded climate and remote sensing fields or by integrating data-driven or process-oriented terrestrial carbon cycle models. The first coordinated attempt to collect regional carbon budgets for nine regions covering the entire globe in the RECCAP-1 project has delivered estimates for the decade 2000–2009, but these budgets were not comparable between regions, due to different definitions and component fluxes reported or omitted. The recent recognition of lateral fluxes of carbon by human activities and rivers, that connect CO2 uptake in one area with its release in another also requires better definition and protocols to reach harmonized regional budgets that can be summed up to the globe and compared with the atmospheric CO2 growth rate and inversion results. In this study, for the international initiative RECCAP-2 coordinated by the Global Carbon Project, which aims as an update of regional carbon budgets over the last two decades based on observations, for 10 regions covering the globe, with a better harmonization that the precursor project, we provide recommendations for using atmospheric inversions results to match bottom-up carbon accounting and models, and we define the different component fluxes of the net land atmosphere carbon exchange that should be reported by each research group in charge of each region. Special attention is given to lateral fluxes, inland water fluxes and land use fluxes.

In the current study, we examine the Indonesian government's watershed management program, which was established in 2001. In 2005, the Coordination Team for Rescue of Water Resources (CTRWR) was established to execute the program on a national level. However, at the time, field implementation was a sectoral interest due to the lack of program integration. To this end, the Indonesian government promoted integrated watershed management in 2009, which since then has been implemented by all stakeholders (in Top–Down management form), with application limited to preparing and planning documents. This is mainly driven by the stakeholders’ lack of understanding with regard to watershed systems as integrated management units. Field implementation results have not yet been realized, including the promotion of community-based watershed management (through Bottom–Up management). The purpose of our research was to determine the index numbers by measuring the level of cooperation between watershed management workers based on the Village Watershed Model (VWM) specifically surface water which includes six variables: planning, participation, institutional, fund sharing, gender, and management systems. The method used was an ordinal measure with the Likert scale. Our data showed successful watershed management, in which five of the six VWM variables—planning, participation, institutional, fund sharing, and management systems—were in the “good” category with indices ranging from 73.08 to 78.27. The gender variable index (69.12) was in the “medium” category.