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In the mid-1990s, forest and aquatic researchers joined forces to better understand how shoreline trees become logs in the water and what they contribute to shoreline ecosystems (riparian zones). What they discovered was big news: Old logs lying in the water along the shorelines of some lakes in northeastern and central Ontario can be more than a thousand years old. While the older logs mostly were white pine, the oldest was a red pine that had a pith date of about 850 A.D., lived until about 1160, fell into the water, and has been floating there ever since as part of a complex tangle of aquatic habitat.
These researchers have conducted several studies over the years, revealing new information about how coarse wood ends up in lakes, how long it persists as potential habitat in the nearshore zone, what ecological services it provides, and how natural mortality and tree fall around lakes change if you harvest only certain trees in riparian zones. Results of this research were incorporated into the Forest Management Guide for Conserving Biodiversity at the Stand and Site Scales, providing new knowledge and science-based support on riparian forest management to Great Lakes-St. Lawrence forest management planning teams.
Want to know more?
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Insights (Vol. 1, No. 1, Page 3)
Age characteristics of coarse woody debris (Pinus strobus) in a lake littoral zone (Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences)
Perspectives on the age and distribution of large wood in riparian carbon pools (Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences)
