Methods for Arctic Vegetation Analysis

To understand how tree stands in the Taiga-Tundra Ecotone (TTE), i.e. the Northern boundary of the boreal region, specifically in the Northern treeline regions and the elevational treelines in Northern mountainous terrain respond to climate changes, we acquire data during our summer expeditions that allow the derivation of temporal and spatial tree stand dynamics.

Our applied methods include

  • Forest inventory, recording the exact position of trees, their height, stem diameter at breast and basal height, vitality status and if they are reproductive active.
  • Establishing long-term monitoring across environmental gradiantes with instrumentation of vegetation plots (TOMST surface and ground temperature and moisture, TOMST dendrometers for tree growth)
  • Recruitment pattern analysis, by determining the age of the individuals of scanned tree discs of larger trees or thin cuts of smaller individuals, and with genetic markers, to assign parents to recruits and thus the distance of seed and pollen dispersal.
  • Additionally, we take needle samples for genetic analyses using nuclear microsatellite primer (SSR) and with recently developed genetic markers, aiming at single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) on the chloroplast and mitochondrial genome. The results are used to reveal local dispersal patterns, population genetics and to infer the historical biogeography.