Recovery of Boreal Forest Carbon Pools Following Stem-Only Harvesting in Quebec, Canada

Foret Montmorency (FM), Quebec, provides an opportunity to use a 77-year chronosequence to evaluate the effects of stem-only harvesting on carbon cycling in a balsam fir-white birch boreal forest. By comparing empirical estimates of 19 carbon pools with those simulated in the Carbon Budget Model (CBM-CFS3), it is possible to assess the accuracy of model assumptions in predicting stand-level carbon dynamics. Although CBM-CFS3 was able to predict total ecosystem carbon within 10% of the empirical mean at stand maturity, many of the dead organic matter (DOM) pools deviated from field observations, indicating that model initialization of DOM pools did not adequately simulate the 1000 year history of C transfers and stand dynamics prior to the harvesting event. Future modifications to CBM-CFS3 initialization assumptions may be required to more accurately simulate the long-term effects of natural disturbances on carbon pools over time for this forest region.f.