Logging pattern and landscape changes over the last century at the boreal and deciduous forest transition in Eastern Canada

Forestry practices associated with the industrial era (since ~1900) have altered the natural disturbance regimes and greatly impacted the world’s forests. We quantified twentieth century logging patterns and regional scale consequences in three sub-boreal forest landscapes of Eastern Canada (117,000, 49,400 and 92,300 ha), comparing forestry maps depicting age and forest cover types for early industrial (1930) and present-day (2000) conditions. Results were similar for the three landscapes, indicating large-scale forest change during the twentieth century. In 1930, previous logging activities had been concentrated in the lowlands and along the main hydrographical network, as compared to a more even distribution over the landscapes in 2000, reflecting a decreasing influence of the environmental constraints on forest harvesting. In 1930, old-aged forests (>100 years) accounted for more than 75% of the unlogged areas of the three landscapes, as compared to less than 15% for the present-day conditions. Logging practices have thus inverted the stand age distribution of the landscapes that are currently dominated by young and regenerating stands. The 1930 forest cover types showed a clear relationship with elevation, with conifers located in the lowlands and mixed and deciduous stands restricted to the upper slopes. Between 1930 and 2000, 58–64% of the conifer areas transformed to mixed and deciduous forests, such that no clear altitudinal relationships remained in 2000. We conclude that twentieth century logging practices have strongly altered the preindustrial vegetation patterns in our study area, to the point that ecosystem-based management strategies should be developed to restore conifer dominance, altitudinal gradients, as well as the irregular structure inspired from old forest stands.     

Climate change will affect the ability of forest management to reduce gaps between current and presettlement forest composition in southeastern Canada

Landscape Ecology - Forest landscapes at the boreal–temperate ecotone have been extensively altered. Reducing the gap between current and presettlement forest conditions through...     

Cell surfaces in plant micro-organism interactions. VIII. Increased proteinase inhibitor activity in melon plants in response to infection by Colletotrichum lagenarium or to treatment with an elicitor fraction from this fungus

Proteinase inhibitor activity had increased sharply in melon seedlings infected by Colletotrichum lagenarium 3 days after inoculation. The activity was associated with heat stable proteins and was effective against the protease produced by the fungus as well as against trypsin. Treatment of healthy melon leaves with an elicitor of ethylene isolated from the pathogen, resulted in a three-fold increase in proteinase inhibitor activity after 24 h. Ethylene production increased early in elicitor-treated leaves and may be involved in the elicitation of proteinase inhibitor activity. In the presence of aminoethoxyvinylglycine, an inhibitor of ethylene biosynthesis, both elicitor-induced ethylene and, to a lesser extent, elicitor-induced proteinase inhibitor activity were inhibited. In contrast, 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylic acid, the direct precursor of ethylene, triggers proteinase inhibitor activity. It is concluded that ethylene is involved in the elicitation of proteinase inhibitor activity, but its exact role remains to be defined.