Experiments
- Site
- Klippen, Västerbotten county board land
- Years
- 2018 - present
- Funder
- Nordic Research Council
- Role
- Principal investigator
3 frames on this sheet
Almost every study of prescribed fire in boreal forest starts after the fire, because that is when somebody thinks to measure. Klippen is different: the plots were laid out and cored in 2018, and the burn happened in 2019. We know exactly what was there before.
Nine hectares in three blocks, burned under a management plan with the county board, with unburned controls on the same slope. Soil carbon, ground layer, seedling recruitment and deadwood, measured annually. Six seasons in, the surface loss is large and the mineral soil loss is not measurable at all, which is roughly what the theory says and rarely what the popular argument says.
The plots are also the best teaching site we have. Students who have walked a burn understand the carbon question in a way that no lecture achieves.
