Demography, dynamics and data: building confidence for simulating changes in the world's forests

Vegetation demographic models (VDMs) are advanced tools for simulating forest responses to climate and land-use changes, and are essential for projecting carbon cycling and large-scale forest management strategies. Despite their increasing incorporation into Earth System Models, VDMs differ in their demographic assumptions, with no prior quantitative comparison of their performance. We benchmarked nine VDMs against observational data from boreal, temperate and tropical sites, assessing their accuracy in predicting tree growth, carbon turnover, biomass stocks and size distributions. Models were simulated under consistent climate conditions with postdisturbance recovery monitored for at least 420 yr. Postdisturbance carbon recovery trajectories showed significant variability while remaining within observational ranges. Initial regrowth rates varied substantially (0.03-0.60, 0.18-0.70 and 0.35-1.10 kgCm<sup>-2</sup> yr<sup>-1</sup> for boreal, temperate and tropical sites, respectively), influenced by each model's initial forest state. Models captured mature forest carbon content but showed compensating effects between overestimated growth and underestimated mortality rates. This first multi-model benchmarking identifies growth and mortality rates as critical calibration targets and highlights the need to refine postdisturbance establishment conditions for model development. We outline specific benchmarking variables needed to improve predictions of forest responses to environmental change.

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Publication Details

Journal
New Phytologist
Published
2025-10-23
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1111/nph.70643
Citations
1
Primary Topic
Forest ecology and management
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
2.31

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article

Demography, dynamics and data: building confidence for simulating changes in the world's forests

Rosie A. Fisher, Adriane Esquivel‐Muelbert, Martin G. De Kauwe, Hisashi Sato et al.
1 citations
New Phytologist
Forest ecology and management
2.31
article

Demography, dynamics and data: building confidence for simulating changes in the world's forests

Rosie A. Fisher, Adriane Esquivel‐Muelbert, Martin G. De Kauwe, Hisashi Sato, GEORGE C. HURTT, Guillaume Marie, Stefan Olin, J. R. Moore, Ensheng Weng, Jürgen Knauer, Benjamin David Stocker, Arthur Argles, Annemarie Eckes‐Shephard, Karl Piltz, Sebastiaan Luyssaert, Lei Ma, Stephen A. Sitch, Mikko Peltoniemi, Aleksi Lehtonen, Thomas A. M. Pugh, Laura Marqués, Charles D. Koven, Bogdan Brzeziecki, Daniel Zuleta, Jessica Needham, Peter M. Cox
article en
1 citations

Abstract

Vegetation demographic models (VDMs) are advanced tools for simulating forest responses to climate and land-use changes, and are essential for projecting carbon cycling and large-scale forest management strategies. Despite their increasing incorporation into Earth System Models, VDMs differ in their demographic assumptions, with no prior quantitative comparison of their performance. We benchmarked nine VDMs against observational data from boreal, temperate and tropical sites, assessing their accuracy in predicting tree growth, carbon turnover, biomass stocks and size distributions. Models were simulated under consistent climate conditions with postdisturbance recovery monitored for at least 420 yr. Postdisturbance carbon recovery trajectories showed significant variability while remaining within observational ranges. Initial regrowth rates varied substantially (0.03-0.60, 0.18-0.70 and 0.35-1.10 kgCm<sup>-2</sup> yr<sup>-1</sup> for boreal, temperate and tropical sites, respectively), influenced by each model's initial forest state. Models captured mature forest carbon content but showed compensating effects between overestimated growth and underestimated mortality rates. This first multi-model benchmarking identifies growth and mortality rates as critical calibration targets and highlights the need to refine postdisturbance establishment conditions for model development. We outline specific benchmarking variables needed to improve predictions of forest responses to environmental change.

New PhytologistVol. 248(6)
University of Technology Sydney (AU), Goddard Institute for Space Studies (US), University of Bern (CH), Met Office (GB), Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research (CH), Bern University of Applied Sciences (CH), Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JP), Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (US), Warsaw University of Life Sciences (PL), Lund University (SE), University of Exeter (GB), Natural Resources Institute Finland (FI), University of Bristol (GB), Partners In Care (US), ForestGEO (US), CICERO Center for International Climate Research (NO), Forest Research (GB), Western Sydney University (AU), University of Maryland, College Park (US), University of Birmingham (GB), Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (NL), University of Gothenburg (SE)
National Science Foundation, Smithsonian Institution, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, European Commission, Nuclear Safety and Security Commission, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Openalex Percentile: Top 10%
Forest ecology and management
2.31
DOIOpen Access PDFOpenAlex
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