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Publications

NIBIOs employees contribute to several hundred scientific articles and research reports every year. You can browse or search in our collection which contains references and links to these publications as well as other research and dissemination activities. The collection is continously updated with new and historical material.

2017

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Sammendrag

The statistical model MESAW (Matrix Equations for Source Apportionment on Watershed) was used to estimate the diffuse unit-area source emission coefficients of nitrogen in Estonian rivers. The input data included monitored riverine loads, point sources and land use categories from a total of 50 rivers/catchment areas. Two independent studies were conducted: the estimation of emission coefficients for the whole of Estonia and for a smaller study area near Tallinn. The results from both cases showed that drained peat soils were the highest diffuse source contributor in unit-area loads. The results show that the unit-area loads from drained peat soils were up to 2.3 times higher than from arable land. Moreover, a comparison of emission coefficients for the whole of Estonia and for the Tallinn catchment area indicated that coefficients can vary significantly between sources and single years. Additional detailed studies and monitoring are needed to support these conclusions.

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1. Population-level management is difficult to achieve if wildlife routinely crosses administrative boundaries, as is particularly frequent for migratory populations. However, the degree of mismatch between management units and scales at which ecological processes operate has rarely been quantified. Such insight is vital for delimiting functional population units of partially migratory species common in northern forest ecosystems. 2. We combined an extensive dataset of 412 GPS-marked red deer (Cervus elaphus) across Norway with information on the size and borders of two administrative levels, the governmental level (municipality) and landowner level (local management units, LMUs), to determine the timing and scale of mismatch between animal space use and management units. We analysed how landscape characteristics affected the use of management units and the timing and likelihood of crossing borders between them, in an effort to delineate more appropriate units in various landscapes. 3. Median municipality size could potentially cover 70% of female and 62% of male annual ranges, while only 12% and 4% of LMUs were expansive enough to accommodate migratory routes in females and males, respectively. Red deer migrate along elevational gradients and are more likely to find both suitable lowland winter habitat and higher summer habitat within management units with variable topography. Consistent with this, the likelihood of border crossing decreased with increasing diversity of elevations. 4. Synthesis and applications. We demonstrate a considerable mismatch between animal space use and management units. Far-ranging movements and frequent administrative border crossings during autumn migration coincides with the period of active management (hunting season). Our study also highlights that, due to extensive movements of males, coordination of management aims may provide a more realistic avenue than increasing sizes of local management units. A more general insight is that the degree of mismatch between range use and management units depends on the season and landscape type. This needs to be accounted for when delimitating functional population units of migratory populations.

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Land surface albedo is a key parameter of the Earth’s climate system. It has high variability in space, time, and land cover and it is among the most important variables in climate models. Extensive large-scale estimates can help model calibration and improvement to reduce uncertainties in quantifying the influence of surface albedo changes on the planetary radiation balance. Here, we use satellite retrievals of Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) surface albedo (MCD43A3), high-resolution land-cover maps, and meteorological records to characterize climatological albedo variations in Norway across latitude, seasons, land-cover type (deciduous forests, coniferous forests, and cropland), and topography. We also investigate the net changes in surface albedo and surface air temperature through site pair analysis to mimic the effects of land-use transitions between forests and cropland and among different tree species. We find that surface albedo increases at increasing latitude in the snow season, and cropland and deciduous forests generally have higher albedo values than coniferous forests, but for few days in spring. Topography has a large influence on MODIS albedo retrievals, with values that can change up to 100% for the same land-cover class (e.g. spruce in winter) under varying slopes and aspect of the terrain. Cropland sites have surface air temperature higher than adjacent forested sites, and deciduous forests are slightly colder than adjacent coniferous forests. By integrating satellite measurements and high-resolution vegetation maps, our results provide a large semi-empirical basis that can assist future studies to better predict changes in a fundamental climate-regulating service such as surface albedo.

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Droughts cause huge losses of society and environment, therefore it is important to study the spatial-temporal pattern of drought. The traditional remote sensing drought indices (AVI, VCI and TCI) only consider the single factor representing the soil moisture (surface temperature or NDVI). The comprehensive remote sensing drought indices (VSWI and TVDI) can estimate the soil moisture more accurately, but they are not suitable for large scale region especially with great elevation variation. In this study, a modifed Temperature Vegetation Drought Index (mTVDI) was constructed based on the correction of elevation and dry edge. Compared with the traditional drought indices, mTVDI had a better relationship with soil moisture in all selected months (R=−0.376, −0.406, −0.459, and −0.265, p<0.05). mTVDI was used to analyze the spatial-temporal patterns of drought in China from 1982 to 2010. The results showed that droughts appeared more frequently in Northwest China and the southwest of Tibet while drought centers of North and Southwest China appeared in Huanghuaihai Plain and Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau respectively. The frequency of drought was increasing as a whole while the frequency of severe drought increased signifcantly by 4.86% and slight drought increased slowly during 1982 to 2010. The results are useful for the understanding of drought and policy making of climate change.

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The fungus Neonectria neomacrospora has recently caused an epidemic outbreak in conifer species within the genus Abies in Denmark and Norway. Christmas tree producers in Europe and North America rely, to a large extent, on Abies species. The damage caused by N. neomacrospora, including dead shoot tips, red flagging of branches and potentially dead trees, have therefore caused concern about reduced quality and loss of trees, and thereby of revenue. Field observations of natural infection of 39 taxa, from 32 species, within the genus Abies in the Hørsholm Arboretum, Denmark, were evaluated; significant differences were seen between taxa, that is, species, and between some species and their subspecies. The Greek fir, Abies cephalonica, was the only species without damage. An inoculation experiment on detached twigs with mycelium plugs from a N. neomacrospora culture showed that all species could be infected. The damage observed in the inoculation experiment could explain 30% of the variation in the field observations based on species mean values. The epidemic outbreak and the high number of species susceptible to this fungus indicate that N. neomacrospora requires attention in the cultivation and conservation of Abies species.