Search results for "forest"
showing 10 items of 3780 documents
A Multi-Criteria Decision Support System for Strategic Planning at the Swiss Forest Enterprise Level: Coping With Climate Change and Shifting Demands…
2021
Sustainable forest management plays a key role for forest biodiversity and the provisioning of ecosystem services (BES), including the important service of carbon sequestration for climate change mitigation. Forest managers, however, find themselves in the increasingly complex planning situation to balance the often conflicting demands in BES. To cope with this situation, a prototype of a decision support system (DSS) for strategic (long-term) planning at the forest enterprise level was developed in the present project. The DSS was applied at three case study enterprises (CSEs) in Northern Switzerland, two lowland and one higher-elevation enterprise, for a 50-year time horizon (2010 to 2060…
Measuring Rainfall Kinetic Power in Two Sicilian Experimental Areas by Drop-Size Distribution Data
2023
The rainfall kinetic energy, which affects soil erosion processes, can be calculated by the drop-size distribution (DSD) and falling velocity. This study presents the outcomes derived by the DSDs recorded with the same optical disdrometer in two experimental areas, located in Sicily (southern Italy). Specifically, the DSDs were recorded from March 2017 to December 2019 at Sparacia and from June 2006 to April 2014 at Palermo. The aims of this paper are both to compare the DSDs for the two sites and to evaluate the applicability of Gamma theoretical distribution. Moreover, the relations of rainfall kinetic power vs. rainfall intensity are assessed. Differences in DSDs, especially for rainfall…
Interactive decision support and trade-off analysis for sustainable forest landscape planning under deep uncertainty
2022
Sustainable environmental management often involves long-term time horizons and multiple conflicting objectives and, by nature, is affected by different sources of uncertainty. Many sources of uncertainty, such as climate change or government policies, cannot be addressed using probabilistic models, and, therefore, they can be seen to contain deep uncertainty. In this setting, the variety of possible future states is represented as a set of scenarios lacking any information about the likelihood of occurring. Integrating deep uncertainty into multiobjective decision support increases complexity, calling for the elaboration of appropriate methods and tools. This paper proposes a novel intera…
Stem-injection of herbicide for control of Ailanthus altissima (Mill.) Swingle: a practical source of power for drilling holes in stems
2013
Abstract: Ailanthus altissima is a well-known invasive tree in many parts of the world showing an outstanding ability to establish within woodlands and other less-disturbed habitats. Previous studies have reported that control of this species is very difficult because of its strong resprouting. Indeed, effective control can be achieved only by mechanical treatment followed by the application of a systemic herbicide. Operating drills or saws and other mechanical equipment require electric power supply which is not readily available in many invaded sites, notably shrubslands and woodlands. In two study sites, we evaluated control obtained by glyphosate through a stem-injection technique and c…
Transformation of clay-sized minerals in soils exposed to prolonged regular alternation of redox conditions
2016
Abstract The direction of the transformation of Fe-bearing minerals under harshly changing redox conditions is still under debate. Some studies suggest preferential accumulation of weakly crystalline Fe oxides while other studies showed that repeated redox cycles favour the presence of crystalline phases. Since characterized by distinct redox cycles, paddy soils are ideal for studying redox-related transformations of Fe oxides and Fe-bearing clay minerals. We analysed changes in the Fe mineral assemblage upon long-term reduction–oxidation cycles along a chronosequence of 100, 700, and 2000-year-old paddy soils developed on comparable parent material relative to two non-irrigated counterpart…
Stakeholders' Perceptions about Fire Impacts on Lithuanian Protected Areas
2014
The aim of this work is to study Lithuanian stakeholders' perceptions of fire impacts in protected areas. For this study, the stakeholders consisted of foresters, ecologists and farmers. A clear understanding of the opinions of stakeholders about fire effects on environmental, social and economic aspects of Lithuanian protected areas will allow an assessment of the stakeholders' reaction to fire policy, including government measures towards fire prevention, suppression and application of prescribed fire to landscape management. The results showed that stakeholders in general think that fire is not a threat to Lithuania and to the ecological processes in the protected areas. However, they ag…
Effect of inoculation with selected Bradyrhizobium spp. on the survival and growth of Acacia mangium saplings after 20 months in the field
1999
This work was designed to test the long-term effect of the inoculation of #Acacia mangium# seedlings with 10 selected strains of #Bradyrhizobium spp.#. The percentage of survival of seedlings inoculated with any of the #Bradyrhizobium# strains was increased by 10% as compared to the control plants. However, out of the 10 #Bradyrhizobium# strains tested, only 3 strains, Aust l3c, Lu 4 and Tel 8, belonging to the phylogenelic group 1, significandy enhanced the growth of #A. mangium# after 20 months in the field. For the first time, inoculation with indigenous Malaysian strains #Bradyrhizobium# such as Tel 8 and Lu 4 at the seedling stage is reported to produce enhanced and sustained growth an…
Response of soil bacteria to Hg (II) in relation to soil characteristics and cell location
2006
The response of indigenous bacterial communities to the addition of inorganic mercury (50 μM of Hg(II)) was compared over a 30 day period in four soils of contrasting properties. Hg(II) impact was estimated by following population dynamics of viable heterotrophic bacteria (VH) and mercury resistant bacteria (HgR) by indirect enumeration in unfractionated soil and in the inner and outer parts of soil aggregates obtained by successive washings. Numbers of VH bacteria in unfractionated soils were not affected by mercury in any of the studied soils, whereas an increase in resistant bacteria was observed in all of them. The lag phase before the increase of HgR bacteria and the magnitude of the e…
COMPARISON OF CRIMSON FOUNTAINGRASS AND DISS FIBRES AS AGGREGATES FOR CEMENT MORTARS
2019
The use of natural fibres in cement composites is an expanding research field as their use can improve the mechanical and thermal behavior of cement mortars and reduce their carbon footprint. In this paper two different wild grasses, i.e. Pennisetum Setaceum, also known as crimson fountaingrass, and Ampelodesmos Mauritanicus, also called diss, are used as source of natural fibres for cement mortars. The principal aim is to evaluate the possibility of using the more invasive crimson fountaingrass in place of diss inside cement based vegetable concrete. The two plants’ fibres have been characterized by means of electron microscopy, helium picnometry; moreover, the thermal conductivity of fibr…
A rational runoff coefficient for a revisited rational formula
2019
The Rational Formula (RF) is probably the most frequently applied equation in practical hydrology to compute the peak discharge, due to its simplicity and effective compromise between theory and data availability. Thus, after more than a century, the estimation of peak discharge through the RF is still an important and challenging issue in hydrology. The RF assumes response linearity and sometimes assumes that the return period does not depend on the runoff coefficient and neglects the time to ponding and the antecedent moisture condition. Moreover, the RF requires the critical duration of rainfall and the runoff coefficient to be estimated, both of which are highly controversial. This pape…