The Forests of Canada in a Changing Climate

Canada in a Changing Climate: Forests
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Canada in a Changing Climate: Forests
Topic Importance
The significance of forests across the globe cannot be understated. People depend on forests for their survival, ranging from air to wood. In addition to providing animal habitats and people’s livelihood, forests also offer watershed protection, minimize soil erosion, and reduce climate change. Also, forests create job opportunities for over 13 million people across the globe, and approximately 300 million people dwell in forests, including 60 million indigenous people (WWF, 2015). Forests offer ecosystem services substantial for human survival, such as providing clean water for consumption and household use, providing food and medicine, and absorbing dangerous greenhouse gases, to mention a few. Forests play a crucial role in Canada’s recreational activities and spiritual welfare. They provide a platform for multiple recreational activities such as hiking, camping, and horseback riding. They also facilitate cultural traditions such as hunting for indigenous people (NRC, 2014). Multiple locations represent various nitrogen loads and different types of forests, such as coniferous and deciduous. They vary geographically from Finland to Italy and from Hungary to Scotland.
Weather Sensitivity
Forests require favorable climatic conditions to thrive. Adverse climatic conditions will result in some tree species shifting their ranges and moving to landscapes they do not fit. Similar to other living organisms, trees migrate to regions they can survive. Climate changes result in creating new habitats for tree species and make existing species unsuitable. Redistribution of trees can lead to some species going extinct, particularly the small range species. A favorable climatic condition facilitates even tree species distribution, preserving indigenous trees in specific locations. Invasive species are among the major threats to forest health, and current climatic variations benefit their invasion. The species’ wide environmental tolerance, exploitation of new surroundings, and hostile colonization of new regions facilitate their survival in dynamic climatic environments. Adverse climatic changes result in warmer temperatures and droughts that lead to forest fire (Donald Stanley Lemmen et al., 2014). The average rise in temperatures due to climate change increases the risk of more extended droughts. Research indicates that trees react to drought stress by closing their stomata, the pores responsible for carbon dioxide intake. Trees are forced to survive on stored sugar and starches upon the closure of stomata and can result in carbon starvation if they run out of their energy sources before the drought is over (Moore, 2021). Climate changes impact the frequency and intensity of wind events such as hurricanes and tornadoes. Wind events have adverse effects on forests regarding their size and dispositions of trees. For instance, the probability of young trees breaking down during a windstorm is lower than big trees since they are more flexible. Lastly, forests thrive in warm and wet climate conditions. High rainfall and ...