1. Lower Middle Regeneration Experiment - Climate & Regeneration INGY 2014 Fred C. Martin WA Dept. Natural Resources Olympia, WA

2. Objectives Evaluate planting versus natural regeneration with respect to survival, growth, and stocking. Evaluate survival, growth, and stocking on forest health, species diversity, stand structure, and yield. Monitor survival and growth of residual over-story trees, and their impact on regeneration. Evaluate effect of covariates (habitat type, understory vegetation, duff, CWD, etc.) on both regeneration and residual overstory trees. Conduct annual measurements to provide validation for climate driven growth models.

3. Design Randomized Complete Block (RBCD) Two Habitat Types – GF/Clun – WH/Clun Two Blocks of Each Habitat Type – GF-1 and GF-2 – WH-1 and WH-2 Two Treatments – No Plant – Plant Replications – Three reps of each treatment in each block – 2 hab typ X 2 blks X 2 tmnts X 3 reps = 24 exp units Split plot design for each planted treatment – Three different species planted in each treatment

5. Block & Rep Layout

6. Replication Details Rectangular 1/10 th acre Replications paired for treatment assignment Divided into 25 1/250 th acre tabulation cells Each planted treatment cell contains one planted – Ponderosa pine (1-1, camp-run stock) – Western larch (2-0, camp-run stock) – Western white pine (Plug-1, 2 nd generation) Trees planted on equal area hexagonal grid

7. WH-2 Rep 2, 1995

8. WH-2 Rep 1, 1997

9. WH-2 Rep 1, 1998

10. WH-2 Rep 1, 2002

11. WH-2 Rep 1, 2013

12. GF-1 Rep 4, 1995

13. GF-1 Rep 4, 2012

14. WH-1 Rep 2, 1997

15. WH-1 Rep2, 1999

16. WH-1 Rep 2, 2000

17. WH-1 Rep 2, 2002

18. WH-1 Rep 2, 2005

19. WH-1 Rep 2, 2010

20. Climate Questions Can temperature be measured with sufficient precision? Is temperature correlated with productivity?

21. Maximum Temperatures

22. Average Temperatures

23. Minimum Temperatures

24. Temperature Differences by Habitat Type

29. Climate Conclusions Temperature can be measured with acceptable precision. Temperature variation is correlated with productivity, although it is weak. Next steps? Humidity sensors adds 2013 Assess the ability to make fine-scale temperature estimates? Expand climate metrics, e.g. growind degree days, PET, etc.

30. Regeneration Questions Is it true that regeneration is greater on the control than on the planted replications? What is the trend of regeneration over time?

39. Regeneration Conclusions Regeneration tends to be greater on the control than on the planted replications. Regeneration is declining over time for seral species but increasing or constant for climax species. Rates of mortality are greater on high versus low productivity. Next steps. Examine covariate effects on survival, ( overstory, competing vegetation, CWD, etc.). Assess rate of growth.