The relationship between leaf area index and microclimate in tropical forest and oil palm plantation: Forest disturbance drives changes in microclimate
File(s)
Published version
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Land use change is a major threat to biodiversity. One mechanism by which land use change influences biodiversity and ecological processes is through changes in the local climate. Here, the relationships between leaf area index and five climate variables – air temperature, relative humidity, vapour pressure deficit, specific humidity and soil temperature – are investigated across a range of land use types in Borneo, including primary tropical forest, logged forest and oil palm plantation. Strong correlations with the leaf area index are found for the mean daily maximum air and soil temperatures, the mean daily maximum vapour pressure deficit and the mean daily minimum relative humidity. Air beneath canopies with high leaf area index is cooler and has higher relative humidity during the day. Forest microclimate is also found to be less variable for sites with higher leaf area indices. Primary forest is found to be up to 2.5 °C cooler than logged forest and up to 6.5 °C cooler than oil palm plantations. Our results indicate that leaf area index is a useful parameter for predicting the effects of vegetation upon microclimate, which could be used to make small scale climate predictions based on remotely sensed data.
Date Issued
2015-02-15
Date Acceptance
2014-11-10
Citation
Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 2015, 201 (1), pp.187-195
ISSN
0168-1923
Publisher
Elsevier
Start Page
187
End Page
195
Journal / Book Title
Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
Volume
201
Issue
1
Copyright Statement
© 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/).
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/).
License URL
Sponsor
The Royal Society
Identifier
http://gateway.webofknowledge.com/gateway/Gateway.cgi?GWVersion=2&SrcApp=PARTNER_APP&SrcAuth=LinksAMR&KeyUT=WOS:000347863900018&DestLinkType=FullRecord&DestApp=ALL_WOS&UsrCustomerID=1ba7043ffcc86c417c072aa74d649202
Grant Number
2008/R2
Subjects
Science & Technology
Life Sciences & Biomedicine
Physical Sciences
Agronomy
Forestry
Meteorology & Atmospheric Sciences
Agriculture
Microclimate
Leaf area index
Land use change
Tropical forest
Disturbance
Oil palm
RAIN-FOREST
TRANSPIRATION
LANDSCAPES
RESPONSES
FRACTION
Publication Status
Published
Date Publish Online
2014-11-28