IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecomod/v431y2020ics0304380020302684.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Height growth–rate at a given height: A mathematical perspective for forest productivity

Author

Listed:
  • Salas-Eljatib, Christian

Abstract

Understanding the height growth of trees is a fundamental component for scientific knowledge and management of forest ecosystems. The height of dominant trees at a reference-age, commonly known as the site-index, is the most widely used forest productivity indicator globally. Yet, it has been criticized for its restricted applicability to monospecific and even-aged forests, making it unreliable for natural forests or mixed-species where there is not a single meaningful age. Here, I develop a mathematical perspective for using height growth-rate at a reference-height as a new type of site index. I provide the mathematical basis for the proposed index and illustrate its application by fitting a nonlinear mixed-effects differential equation model to tree height growth data of three Nothofagus species in southern Chile. The proposed index allows us to foresee and analyze growth patterns, not only by representing growth-rates as a function of time but also of size. In doing so, the proposed index makes tree growth and productivity analyses accessible to a broader community of researchers.

Suggested Citation

  • Salas-Eljatib, Christian, 2020. "Height growth–rate at a given height: A mathematical perspective for forest productivity," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 431(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecomod:v:431:y:2020:i:c:s0304380020302684
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2020.109198
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304380020302684
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2020.109198?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Pommerening, Arne & Muszta, Anders, 2016. "Relative plant growth revisited: Towards a mathematical standardisation of separate approaches," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 320(C), pages 383-392.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Myllymäki, Mari & Kuronen, Mikko & Bianchi, Simone & Pommerening, Arne & Mehtätalo, Lauri, 2024. "A Bayesian approach to projecting forest dynamics and related uncertainty: An application to continuous cover forests," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 491(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Pommerening, Arne & Szmyt, Janusz & Zhang, Gongqiao, 2020. "A new nearest-neighbour index for monitoring spatial size diversity: The hyperbolic tangent index," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 435(C).
    2. Stankova, Tatiana V. & González-Rodríguez, Miguel Ángel & Diéguez-Aranda, Ulises & Ferezliev, Angel & Dimitrova, Proletka & Kolev, Kristiyan & Stefanova, Penka, 2024. "Productivity-environment models for Scots pine plantations in Bulgaria: an interaction of anthropogenic origin peculiarities and climate change," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 490(C).
    3. Wilson Lara & Stella Bogino & Felipe Bravo, 2018. "Multilevel analysis of dendroclimatic series with the R-package BIOdry," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(5), pages 1-23, May.
    4. Albers, Ariane & Collet, Pierre & Lorne, Daphné & Benoist, Anthony & Hélias, Arnaud, 2019. "Coupling partial-equilibrium and dynamic biogenic carbon models to assess future transport scenarios in France," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 239(C), pages 316-330.
    5. Häbel, Henrike & Myllymäki, Mari & Pommerening, Arne, 2019. "New insights on the behaviour of alternative types of individual-based tree models for natural forests," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 406(C), pages 23-32.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ecomod:v:431:y:2020:i:c:s0304380020302684. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/ecological-modelling .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.