David J. Mladenoff

David J. Mladenoff
University of Wisconsin–Madison | UW · Department of Forest and Wildlife Ecology

PhD

About

260
Publications
84,270
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17,180
Citations

Publications

Publications (260)
Article
Full-text available
Much remains unknown regarding the linkages between forest structure and microclimate as they regulate detrital decomposition. In this study, we use a factorial field experiment that included canopy gap creation and downed woody material (DW) additions conducted in a mature northern hardwood forest. Our objectives were to (1) test the individual an...
Article
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Introduction: Field experiments of gap-based harvest systems in temperate northern hardwood forests have provided inconsistent support for the theory that such regeneration approaches can improve regeneration success among increasingly underrepresented tree species intermediate in shade tolerance. We established a field experiment in Wisconsin, USA...
Article
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Deer herbivory has a reputation for suppressing tree seedling development in Northern hardwood forests. We examined survival and growth of sugar maple (Acer saccharum) and ash (Fraxinus spp.) seedlings in a controlled factorial experiment with differing light conditions and levels of deer access in a Northern hardwoods forest in Wisconsin, USA. Mea...
Article
Full-text available
Context Ecological structure in ecotones, defined by how species from adjacent systems co-occur, affects ecosystem functions and climate change responses. Ecotone structure can vary spatially, yet variability in broader-scale ecotones is poorly understood. In Wisconsin (USA) the Tension Zone is an ecoregional ecotone, separating northern and southe...
Article
Changes in woody biomass over centuries to millennia are poorly known, leaving unclear the magnitude of terrestrial carbon fluxes before industrial-era disturbance. Here, we statistically reconstructed changes in woody biomass across the upper Midwestern region of the United States over the past 10,000 years using a Bayesian model calibrated to pre...
Article
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Wind disturbance in northern hardwood forests of the US North Central Great Lakes region creates heterogeneously distributed structural attributes such as downed woody debris (DWD) and canopy openings across temporal and spatial scales. The decomposition of DWD contributes to greenhouse gas (GHG) fluxes, provides habitat, and potentially influences...
Article
Bitternut hickory (Carya cordiformis (Wangenh.) K. Koch) is an important component of many hardwood forest systems in the northern hardwood forests of the Lake States. Extensive mortality of the species was observed in a long-term field experimental site in a second growth northern hardwood forest of Wisconsin between 2010 and 2016. We quantified a...
Article
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Downed woody debris (DWD) creates heterogeneous microsites that are beneficial to enhancing biodiversity and that represent persistent nutrient and carbon pools. Windthrow events characteristic of northern deciduous forests naturally produce abundant DWD and canopy openings that enhance structural complexity, but group selection harvesting reduces...
Article
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We present gridded 8 km-resolution data products of the estimated stem density, basal area, and biomass of tree taxa at Euro-American settlement of the midwestern United States during the middle to late 19th century for the states of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, and Indiana. The data come from settlement-era Public Land Survey (PLS) da...
Article
Natural forest disturbance events can influence soil biogeochemical processes in two ways-by creating downed woody debris (DWD; fallen tree boles or branches) and by creating canopy gaps that alter forest microclimate. DWD represents a substrate for microbial growth and a persistent store of carbon and nutrients, but microbial activity is also sens...
Article
Full-text available
Context: Since the nineteenth century, rural areas have experienced progressive abandonment mostly due to socioeconomic changes, with direct and indirect effects on forest disturbance regimes occurring in these human-dominated landscapes. The role of land abandonment in modifying disturbance regimes has been highlighted for some types of disturbanc...
Article
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Questions: How do deer mediate the response of forest ground-layer plant communities to canopy gap size? Location: Flambeau River State Forest in north central Wisconsin, USA (47°37.4'N, 90°47.8'W) Method: We examined responses of resources, growth forms and temporal guilds to factorial combinations of canopy gap treatments consisting of a range...
Article
Questions Spatial characteristics of ecotones can affect ecotone function and define their role in ecological systems. Identifying ecotone location is necessary to quantify the relationship between spatial characteristics and function, yet there is no standard approach, particularly for compositionally complex ecotones where binary classification f...
Preprint
Full-text available
We present gridded 8 km-resolution data products of the estimated biomass, basal area, and stem density of tree taxa at the time of Euro-American settlement of the midwestern United States for the states of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, and Indiana. The data come from settlement-era Public Land Survey (PLS) data (ca. 0.8-km resolution)...
Article
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Forest development is a complex phenomenon which, for the number of actors involved and the response time expressed by forests, is difficult to understand and explore. Forests in Italy, as in several areas of Europe, are experiencing intensive management and recently, an increasing impact by ungulates. The effects on forest development of these two...
Article
Forest soil ecosystems can be negatively affected by intensive biomass harvesting due to losses of organic inputs and soil compaction, ultimately leading to reduced forest productivity. In this research, we revisited a site from the North American Long-Term Soil Productivity study located on a sandy Spodosol within the Huron National Forest in Mich...
Article
Ecological forestry is a management approach that uses natural disturbance processes as models for designing silvicultural prescriptions that restore or sustain ecosystem biodiversity and function in actively managed forests. We evaluated how a novel ecologically-based multi-cohort silvicultural treatment affects the soil microbial community (SMC)...
Article
Full-text available
Sampling point‐to‐tree distances is a simple plotless technique for estimating forest density that is readily applied in modern stands and retroactively with historical surveys. Although plotless density estimators (PDEs) have been applied in over 1000 ecological publications, the accuracy and precision of the techniques remain poorly understood an...
Chapter
Understanding the value of remaining old-growth forest requires that we evaluate it in the spatial context in which it occurs and in the alterations of that context over the last 150 years. We can see this visually at the regional scale. The northern Lake States forests of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan, are at the northwestern edge of the nort...
Article
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Climate change is projected to have negative implications for forest ecosystems and their dependent communities and industries. Adaptation studies of forestry practices have focused on maintaining the provisioning of ecosystem services; however, those practices may have implications for climate change mitigation as well by increasing biological sin...
Article
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Today, most ecosystems show some degree of human modification, ranging from subtle influences to complete remodeling and reshaping into anthropogenic ecosystems. In the first issue of the journal Ecosystems, the field of historical ecology, which focuses on the historical development of ecosystems, was prominently positioned with the papers of Fost...
Article
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Background EuroAmerican land-use and its legacies have transformed forest structure and composition across the United States (US). More accurate reconstructions of historical states are critical to understanding the processes governing past, current, and future forest dynamics. Here we present new gridded (8x8km) reconstructions of pre-settlement (...
Data
Zip file with taxon assignments for PLSS surveyor records. (ZIP)
Data
Zip archive with correction factors for PLSS survey data. (ZIP)
Data
Zip file for all data processing. (DOCX)
Data
Zip archive with base raster and gridded data output as csv files. (ZIP)
Article
Expanding the scope of landscape genetics beyond the level of single species can help to reveal how species traits influence responses to environmental change. Multispecies studies are particularly valuable in highly threatened taxa, such as turtles, in which the impacts of anthropogenic change are strongly influenced by interspecific differences i...
Article
Short-rotation woody biomass crops (SRWCs) have been proposed as an alternative feedstock for biofuel production in the Northeastern US that leads to the conversion of current open land to woody plantations, potentially altering the soil microbial community structures and hence functions. We used pyrosequencing of 16S and 28S rRNA genes in soil to...
Article
Intensive forest biomass harvesting, or the removal of harvesting slash (woody debris from tree branches and tops) for use as biofuel, has the potential to negatively affect the soil microbial community (SMC) due to loss of carbon and nutrient inputs from the slash, alteration of the soil microclimate, and increased nutrient leaching. These effects...
Article
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Perennial cellulosic feedstocks may have potential to reduce life-cycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by offsetting fossil fuels. However, this potential depends on meeting a number of important criteria involving land cover change, including avoiding displacement of agricultural production, not reducing uncultivated natural lands that provide bio...
Data
Supplementary information for the manuscript. (DOCX)
Article
EuroAmerican land use and its legacies have transformed forest structure and composition across the United States (US). More accurate reconstructions of historical states are critical to understanding the processes governing past, current, and future forest dynamics. Gridded (8x8km) estimates of pre-settlement (1800s) forests from the upper Midwest...
Article
Full-text available
We present a gridded 8 km-resolution data product of the estimated composition of tree taxa at the time of Euro-American settlement of the northeastern United States and the statistical methodology used to produce the product from trees recorded by land surveyors. Composition is defined as the proportion of stems larger than approximately 20 cm dia...
Conference Paper
Background/Question/Methods Spatial and temporal variation in forest canopy structure can function to maintain tree species diversity when regenerating seedlings partition associated environmental and resource gradients. However, canopy gaps can also affect patterns of herbivory and the productivity of associated species in the ground-layer. We ex...
Article
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Pulses of respiration from coarse woody debris (CWD) have been observed immediately following canopy disturbances, but it is unclear how long these pulses are sustained. Several factors are known to influence carbon flux rates from CWD, but few studies have evaluated more than temperature and moisture. We experimentally manipulated forest structure...
Article
We developed models and provide computer code to make carcass recovery data more useful to wildlife managers. With these tools, wildlife managers can understand the spatial, temporal (e.g., across time periods, seasons), and demographic patterns in mortality causes from carcass recovery datasets. From datasets of radio-collared and non-collared car...
Article
Forest harvesting and the associated loss of nutrients and carbon has the potential to negatively affect the soil microbial community, which plays a significant role in the health and productivity of the forest ecosystem. We used an experiment to evaluate the effects of group selection using whole-tree harvesting on the soil microbial community in...
Article
Full-text available
Current and future human and forest landscape conditions are influenced by the cumulative, unfolding history of socialecological interactions. Examining past system responses, especially unintended consequences, can reveal valuable insights that promote learning and adaptation in forest policy and management. Temporal couplings are complex, however...
Article
Department of Geography, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 550 North ParkStreet, Madison, WI 53706, USAThe influence of climate on forest change during thepast century in the eastern United States was evalu-ated in a recent paper (Nowacki & Abrams, 2014)that centers on an increase in ‘highly competitivemesophytic hardwoods’ (Nowacki & Abrams, 2008)an...
Article
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Disturbance can function to maintain diversity within forest communities; however, specific mechanisms and the relationship to productivity are not well understood. We examined these linkages in forest ground‐layer plant communities using a replicated, manipulative field experiment. Treatments included a range of gap sizes and untreated controls. W...
Article
Structural heterogeneity has become a goal of contemporary forest management, yet the effect of incorporating variable sized canopy openings characteristic of older forests on ecosystem services is still largely unknown. Single-tree selection silviculture reduces tree species diversity, and group-selection harvests often produce inconsistent result...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Background / Purpose: We have limited understanding of how the growth of individual, co-occurring tree species will be altered by climate change, but making such projections is important both for managing forest resources and for advancing knowledge of forest behavior under global change. Here we apply an ecophysiological forest production model...
Article
The effects of forest management on soil carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) dynamics vary by harvest type and species. We simulated long-term effects of bole-only harvesting of aspen (Populus tremuloides) on stand productivity and interaction of CN cycles with a multiple model approach. Five models, Biome-BGC, CENTURY, FORECAST, LANDIS-II with Century-bas...
Conference Paper
Background/Question/Methods Ecological forestry practices include managing for older forest with its more diverse structure of canopy opening sizes and abundance and more downed coarse woody debris. To better understand the effects of this structural heterogeneity on ecosystem function and services, we conducted a large, replicated field experime...
Article
Full-text available
Experimental canopy gap formation and additions of coarse woody debris (CWD) are techniques intended to mimic the disturbance regime and accelerate the development of northern hardwood forests. The effects of these techniques on biodiversity and ecosystem functioning were investigated by surveying the abundance and diversity of wood-inhabiting fung...
Article
Aim To review and synthesize multiple lines of evidence that describe the spatial patterns of land use associated with prehistoric and early historical Native American societies in eastern North America in order to better characterize the type, spatial extent and temporal persistence of past land use. Location Temperate forests of eastern North Am...
Article
Uncertainty exists over the magnitude of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with open land conversion to short-rotation woody biomass crops (SRWC) for bioenergy in the Northern U.S. Lake States. GHG debts incurred at the plantation establishment phase may delay the climate mitigation benefits of SRWC production. To better understand GHG debt...
Article
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Questions. Do ecological sorting processes and functional diversity of forest ground-layer plant communities vary among mature (65-85 year-old) even-aged, managed uneven-aged and old-growth forest stands? How does functional diversity relate to environmental variables within stands? Location. Northern temperate deciduous forests of Wisconsin and th...
Article
Forest ecosystems across the Northwoods will face direct and indirect impacts from a changing climate over the 21st century. This assessment evaluates the vulnerability of forest ecosystems in the Laurentian Mixed Forest Province of northern Wisconsin and western Upper Michigan under a range of future climates. Information on current forest conditi...
Article
Full-text available
Canopy gaps and coarse woody debris are two forest structural features that are more abundant in old-growth forests than in second-growth, even-aged stands. These features directly influence the carbon balance of the ecosystem, yet few studies have quantified their interactive effects. We experimentally manipulated the forest structure of a second-...
Article
Full-text available
Spatial simulation may be used to model the potential effects of current biodiversity approaches on future habitat modification under differing climate change scenarios. To illustrate the approach, spatial simulation models, including landscape-level forest dynamics,were developed for a semi-natural grassland of conservation concern in a southern I...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Background/Question/Methods Forests in the northern Great Lakes region have been experiencing the effects of a warming climate and will be further affected by the continuous warming (and likely wetter) climate. The collective effects of changing climate are complex due to strong interactions with forest growth and succession, increasing timber ha...
Conference Paper
Background/Question/Methods Understanding how environmental factors and disturbance regimes control vegetation and the scales at which they operate is a perennial goal of ecology. Historical tree records before significant human activities provide valuable vegetation information. The US Public Land Survey (PLS) data from the US general Land Offic...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Background/Question/Methods If forest-derived biofuel is going to be a significant part of our current and future energy portfolio, we need to understand how intensive harvesting practices affect soil quality and health, which are integral to ecosystem stability and sustainable forestry practices. A rapid-response soil indicator metric, such as m...
Article
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Peatlands and forested wetlands can cover a large fraction of the land area and contain a majority of the regional carbon pool in wet northern temperate landscapes. We used the LANDIS-II forest landscape succession model coupled with a model of plant community and soil carbon responses to water table changes to explore the impacts of declining wate...
Article
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Forest insects cause defoliation disturbances with complex spatial dynamics. These are difficult to measure but critical for models of disturbance risk that inform forest management. Understanding of spatial dynamics has lagged behind other disturbance processes because traditional defoliation sketch map data often suffered from inadequate precisio...
Article
Spring phenology in temperate forest ecosystems is responding in diverse ways to global climate change, with unknown consequences for insect disturbances that affect forest productivity. Adaptive forest management that anticipates changes in insect disturbance regimes requires an understanding of the mechanistic links between climate and disturbanc...
Article
Short-rotation woody biomass crops (SRWC) have been proposed as a major feedstock source for bioenergy generation in the Northeastern US. To quantify the environmental effects and greenhouse gas (GHG) balance of crops including SRWC, investigators need spatially explicit data which encompass entire plantation cycles. A knowledge gap exists for the...
Article
Full-text available
Models that use large-footprint waveform light detection and ranging (lidar) to estimate forest height, structure, and biomass have typically used either point data extracted from the waveforms or cumulative distributions of the waveform energy, disregarding potential information latent within the waveform shape. Shape-based metrics such as the cen...
Article
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Fire-adapted forests of the Lake Statesregion are poorly studied relative to those of the western and southeastern United States and our knowledge base of regional short- and long-term fire effects on soils is limited. We compiled and assessed the body of literature addressing fire effects on soils in Lake States forests to facilitate the re-measur...
Conference Paper
Background/Question/Methods Effects of harvesting on site productivity and soil C/N dynamics appear to vary by differences in species composition, soil conditions, and harvesting practices. Since the impacts may exist beyond the duration of a single rotation, or an observed change in one rotation may not necessarily continue in perpetuity, ecosys...
Conference Paper
Background/Question/Methods There is potential for large-scale production of short-rotation woody bioenergy crops (SRWC) in the Northern Lakes States as part of a new bioenergy economy. Land-use change could result in environmental impacts such as greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions or changes to soil carbon (C) stocks and nitrogen (N) availability. W...