Author: harvardforest

March 5: Growing Solar & Protecting Nature with Jonathan Thompson

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Resarch Discussion: Growing Solar, Protecting Nature

Tuesday, March 5, 6:00-7:30pm
Fisher Museum at Harvard Forest
324 North Main Street
Petersham, MA 01366

Massachusetts needs more solar energy to meet its goal of reaching net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. But so far, much of the solar energy deployed in central and western Massachusetts has been built at the expense of forests, farmlands, and some of our most biodiverse habitats. This pattern isn’t good for the climate; forests, wetlands, and farm soils absorb one tenth of our state’s greenhouse gas emissions each year.

We must find a way to build most of our needed solar energy on rooftops, parking lots, and already-developed land. Harvard Forest teamed up with Mass Audubon researchers for a statewide study that proves this is possible—but only with the right policy changes. 

Image shows a hawk sitting on solar panels.

Please join our Research Director and Senior Ecologist Jonathan Thompson and Mass Audubon Vice President of Policy and Advocacy Michelle Manion to learn about this important research and our recommendations for how Massachusetts can responsibly meet its solar energy goals.

Light refreshments will be provided. Please register to attend in person using this form. If you are unable to attend in person but would like to join via Zoom, please register here.

The Harvard Forest welcomes individuals with disabilities to participate in its programs and activities. If you require visitor accommodations or assistance, please contact hfvisit@fas.harvard.edu or 978-724-3302, preferably at least one week in advance of your visit. Learn more about accessibility at Harvard Forest.

Thumbnail photo above: Located in Mendon, MA, a solar array now occupies land that was previously forested and partially used for farming. The total system size is about 4.1 MW DC. Photo by Lucas Faria.

First-Year Seminar Students End Semester with Symposium

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Each fall, Harvard first-year students have the opportunity to take Research at the Harvard Forest-Global Change Ecology-Forests, Ecosystem Function, the Future. Led by Harvard Forest Senior Forest Ecologist Dave Orwig, this First-Year Seminar Program course immerses students in an active field research setting and provides interactions with several leading global change scientists at Harvard Forest.

Eleven students and their proctor stand together on the shore of a pond

Eleven students from the fall 2023 semester recently culimanted their learning by presenting independent research on a topic related to climate change in the region. This year, students chose topics including extreme changes in precipitation, the forest management implications of nonindigenous species, environmental justice, and the Lyme disease epidemic in New England.

In addition to leadership by Dr. Orwig, this year’s cohort was supported by proctor Tyler White, a student at the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Photos of the 2023 cohort, including Proctor Tyler White, by Dave Orwig.

Harvard Student Opportunity: Spring 2024 Internship in Indigenous Land/Food Sovereignty

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Spring Remote Internship: Connecting Indigenous Community Health and Land History/Futures

Open to currently enrolled Harvard undergraduates and graduate students (including international students)

APPLICATIONS FOR THIS POSITION ARE NOW CLOSED.

Mentored by: Cheryll Toney Holley, Harvard 2023-2024 Bullard Fellow and Sonksq (female chief) of the Hassanamisco Nipmuc Band

Additional mentors: Andrea Smith, sub-chief for Tribal Heath & Wellness, Hassanamisco Nipmuc Band; with support from Emily Johnson & Clarisse Hart, Harvard Forest

Stipend: $1,320 for undergraduates; $1,500 for graduate students

# of hours: 60 total (20 hours/month from Feb. 14 to May 14, 2024)

Public health data collected by Nipmuc tribal members in 2018 reveals that over 51% of Nipmuc families are affected by diabetes or heart disease. Both of these health outcomes are documented to have causal origins in diminished food and land sovereignty in Indigenous communities.

We seek a Harvard student intern – or pair of student interns – to:

  • Synthesize Nipmuc public health data and wider public health literature related to land/food sovereignty
    • DELIVERABLE: create a narrative with data visualizations / infographics – essentially a brief, digital report – for Nipmuc tribal leaders and community members
    • GOAL: help visibilize a pathway to stronger health outcomes through strengthened food and land sovereignty
  • Research the history of 3 land parcels in Western Massachusetts currently being returned to, or hoped to be returned to, the tribe through a land-back process
    • DELIVERABLE: create an interactive map for tribal members to explore the history of land use on the 3 parcels
    • GOAL: help build an understanding of the Indigenous and colonial history, and any potential environmental hazards or other important notes, towards informed reclamation of the sites

A successful candidate will possess some (though not necessarily all) of the skills and experiences below. 

  • Experience working with public health data from minoritized communities
  • Experience working with primary archival data, especially land data such as deeds
  • Independence in accomplishing work remotely (students will likely only meet weekly with their mentor)
  • Curiosity and patience when you encounter roadblocks
  • A commitment to supporting tribal sovereignty throughout the project

Full travel support and meals will be provided to interns who are interested in traveling to Harvard Forest (1.5 hours away from the main campus, by car) to for day-trips to meet Chief Holley in person 1-2 times during the spring semester.

APPLICATIONS FOR THIS POSITION ARE NOW CLOSED. 

(Photo by Cheryll Toney Holley)

Eddy Flux Researchers Convene at Harvard Forest for AmeriFlux's 2023 Annual Meeting

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Last month, Harvard Forest hosted the AmeriFlux Annual Meeting, where nearly 100 researchers converged to discuss their work using eddy flux tower data from throughout the world. The longest continually running tower of its kind, Harvard Forest’s Environmental Measurement Station Eddy Flux Tower has been collecting data on the exchange of carbon dioxide and evapotranspiration between the atmosphere and the ecosystem since 1990.

A man climbs a narrow steel tower that has scientific monitoring equipment mounted on it

Before Harvard Forest had research towers – we now have five! – Harvard University’s Steve Wofsy (photographed climbing the tower in the 1990’s) wanted to understand how processes in the forest (biological factors such as tree growth and soil microbial decomposition) influenced the atmosphere (factors such as carbon dioxide greenhouse gas concentrations). The resulting eddy flux tower measures CO2, water vapor, and heat exchange every hour and is now one of over 110 active sites throughout the Americas.

It’s easy to underestimate the significance of Harvard Forest’s original eddy flux tower –it’s not a tower visitors can climb, and it’s measuring invisible things. But thousands of researchers use its data to understand how ecosystems are changing, how they respond to stressors, and as a way to synthesize data for climate change modeling. The long-term nature of it helps answer questions that might otherwise be difficult to understand. “Flux towers are the picture on the puzzle box and the puzzle pieces inside are things like tree growth, soil microbial respiration, and water transport by trees,” says Jackie Matthes, Harvard Forest Senior Scientist. In addition to data collected by the flux tower, Matthes and her research team, in collaboration with William Munger at Harvard University, measure the growth of trees, the amount of biomass produced by leaves each year, and rates of decomposition. She explains that altogether these pieces add up to “the breathing of the ecosystem.”

A student stands in front of a large poster mounted on an easel

As one of the first eddy flux towers and longest-running datasets of its kind, Harvard Forest’s CO2 data has been very well-known in this area of research. Since 1996, the grassroots AmeriFlux network has connected eddy flux researchers for annual meetings to discuss shared data, train people in making measurements, and share technical knowledge. Sam Jurado, an alumni of the Harvard Forest Summer Research Program in Ecology (’23) and current senior at Cornell University, presented to discuss his summer research using the EMS tower data (photographed).

With so many people using Harvard Forest data, hosting the 2023 Annual Meeting at Harvard Forest really connected the dots. “A lot of folks have worked with these data for decades, but by coming here they see the trees and surrounding ecosystem,” says Matthes. Attendees also visited the Forest’s Hemlock Flux Tower and a National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) site completed in 2014, allowing cross-cutting collaboration between research networks.

Matthes works with Principal Investigator William Munger, Harvard University Senior Research Fellow in Atmospheric Chemistry, to conduct research that is supported by the AmeriFlux grant.

The AmeriFlux network is based out of the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, whose team helps manage data and keep flux towers running. Research for this work is supported by the US Department of Energy and NSF’s Long-Term Ecological Research Network.

We extend our gratitude to Christin Buechner for her support in organizing the event.

Tree Ring Lab Identifies Champion Elder

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This summer, at a forest dominated by Eastern Hemlock in northwestern Pennsylvania, Harvard Forest’s Tree Ring Lab team, led by Neil Pederson and David Orwig, confirmed the oldest-known Eastern Hemlock to date. This tree, discovered by team field scout Erik Danielson, turns out to be at least 651 years old.

With over 3,000 Hemlocks cored over the past 50 years, Eastern Hemlock (Tsuga canadensis) is likely the most cored tree species in Eastern North America. Based on available data, this Hemlock surpasses the previous elder, which was identified in the late 1970’s (in the very same forest!). This new discovery adds nearly 100 years (and nearly 20%) to the maximum known age for the most-cored tree species, indicating that there is much basic natural history to learn about our forests.

While most trees are cored at the 1-meter mark, this individual had hollowed out at the base, requiring researchers to take a sample at 2 meters in height. Based on research led by Dave Orwig, we know Eastern Hemlock can often show evidence of adding 35-80+ years of age when under 1 m tall. This suggests that this individual could easily be 700 to 800 years of age at the root collar!

The team’s plot-level sampling of this stand revealed multiple Eastern Hemlocks that are over 400 years, including around half a dozen that are in between 480 and 535 years in age. This new discovery further confirms that this forest is truly the current epicenter of longevity for Eastern Hemlock to date in eastern North America.

Harvard Forest’s Tree Ring Lab has sampled nearly 100 Eastern Hemlock individuals in this forest, with many samples yet to process. The lab analyses will be exciting as we peer further back in time on the long-term development of this old Eastern Hemlock forest.

Learn more about the Tree Ring Lab’s work this past summer by checking out this article in the Post Standard.

Two researchers examine trees in a forest

Above, Dave Orwig (left) and Laura Smith (right) conduct research at the old growth Eastern Hemlock forest. Below, a photograph of the tree’s sample, or “core,” shows tick marks for each year of growth. A zoomed in version of this image is shown above. (Photos courtesy of Neil Pederson)

Witness Tree in Action

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On Tuesday, November 28th on Zoom, members of the Harvard Forest Schoolyard Ecology community gathered to learn about exciting developments in how the Witness Tree project has been translated for classroom use.

Under the guidance of the Harvard Forest team Clarisse Hart and Katharine Hinkle and collaborators Dr. Tim Rademacher, Dr. Taylor Jones, and Dr. Joy Winborne, two recent Harvard graduate student alums, Yiou Wang (GSD ’23) and Aika Yamamoto (HGSE ’23) developed an interactive tool and an educational frame that allows students to see visualizations of data from the Witness Tree including Vapor Pressure Deficit and phenology camera images. Visualizations of sap flow and dendrometer data are forthcoming.

Technical assistance was provided by Dr. Emery Boose and Dr. Jackie Matthes (and Etta Matthes too). Long time Schoolyard Educator Collaborator Dr. Elisa Margarita of Brooklyn Technical High School developed detailed lesson plans that encourage classes to explore what the Witness Tree can tell us about how droughts and floods effect the health of trees and of our forests. These lessons were then piloted by other educator collaborators, Karen Murphy of Amherst Regional High School, Eli Jarvis of the Bement School, Suneetha Panda of Northeast High School in Macon, Georgia, and Kathleen Boucher-Lavigne of the Pike School. All materials can be found out at the Witness Tree Social Media Project website.

The image above shows a LiDAR representation of the Witness Tree created by the Schaaf Lab at UMass Boston.

Fall at Harvard Forest: A Flurry of Visitors

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Each fall at Harvard Forest, the slowing production of chlorophyll is met with a quickening pace of visitors. While our foliage was a bit less vibrant this year due to weather extremes, the seasonal influx of visitors to the Forest was no match to previous years.

Since the onset of the fall semester, the research and outreach staff at Harvard Forest hosted over 1,000 visitors to our 4,000-acre research site. Students from throughout the University took advantage of the Forest’s hands-on facilities: members of Harvard Climate Leaders, undergraduates from OEB, Graduate School of Design students, those from the First-Year Outdoor Program, Freshman Seminar, and over 150 others joined via free bus trips from main campus. Beyond Harvard, other universities continued a long tradition of bringing their students out for experiental learning: Wesleyan, the University of Rhode Island, UMass Amherst, Franklin Pierce University, Mount Holyoke, and UConn students all coalesce as leaves senesce in a flurry of foliage and learning.

Harvard Forest has the good fortune of hosting scientific, conservation, and legislative groups from throughout the region, including a recent retreat of the Biden Administration’s Mature and Old Growth core writing group. In early October, over 150 international climate scholars met to discuss Ameriflux research throughout South, Central, and North America.

Connections with visitors expands the perspective of Harvard Forest community members, who bring new knowledge to our next generation of climate change leaders. Harvard Forest’s Schoolyard Ecology Program supports regional K-12 teachers with hands-on ecological research, and fall field trips to the Forest build upon schoolyard research to help students conceptualize the importance of their scientific contributions.

Like the forest beings, the Harvard Forest community is exhausted by this final push in energy! But by going beyond ecological inventories, examination of atmosphere exchange, and peer-review processes, we strive to share our research to help guide stewardship of the planet.

Bullard Spotlight: Social-Ecological Frameworks with Rinku Roy Chowdhury

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Forests, across a wide range of geographic, ecological, and social contexts, are common pool resource systems characterized by distinct forms of governance, with diverse implications for sustainability and resilience. Rinku Roy Chowdhury has been researching aspects of land use and socio-ecological resilience for several decades. Her work uses geospatial as well as qualitative approaches to help illuminate how individual agencies (e.g., in land management) interact with collective action (e.g., community-based management) and/or broader policy structures (e.g., market incentives or conservation restrictions) to shape landscape patterns and forest ecology at local and regional scales. She draws theoretical and empirical inspiration for this work from the fields of Institutional theory (Collective Action theory), Land System Science, and political ecology.

Rinku, who is a Professor of Geography at Clark University, and former co-chair of the Global Land Programme, has worked in locations as diverse as urban forests in the United States, the lowland Maya forest of Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula, and coastal mangroves in Latin America and South Asia. During her time as Bullard Fellow, she has turned her attention closer to home, to the forests of central Massachusetts, and by extension, New England. These forests represent impressively diverse assemblages of property regimes, management, land history, and ecological conditions. This is exciting terrain for Rinku, who long has loved hiking these lands, but is now working to apply powerful social-ecological explanatory frameworks to shed new light on their history, management, and resilience.

Rinku was drawn to Harvard Forest because of its scientists’ deep knowledge of New England forests and environmental history, and collaborative networks on forest stewardship (e.g., the Wildlands and Woodlands program, work with the USDA Forest Service Family Forest Research Center at UMass-Amherst). Her overarching hope is to develop a long-term partnership with Harvard Forest and relevant stewardship networks to advance a systematic, robust understanding of New England’s forested landscapes as complex socio-ecological systems produced under varying governance regimes and land use histories, with distinct implications for resilience to future climate or policy/economic stressors.

By Rinku Roy Chowdhury

New Publication Offers Strategies to Address Ash Loss

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The impacts of ash mortality in the region have been multifaceted, with the emerald ash borer leading to ecological, cultural, and economic loss. Seeing this decline firsthand, Harvard Forest Senior Ecologist Dave Orwig and a team of researchers have created Managing Northeastern Forests Threatened by Emerald Ash Borer, a publication that describes adaptive strategies available to address the loss of ash from our forests.

The resource, which also describes opportunities to help ash species survive the nonindigenous emerald ash borer (EAB), was led by UMass Amherst’s Paul Catanzaro in collaboration with other institutions and tribes throughout the northeast. The publication, which stresses the opportunity to help maintain the presence of ash, including strategies such as addressing deer herbivory and identifying female, seed-producing trees. Printed copies of the report can be requested by contacting Paul Catanzaro at paulcat@umass.edu

New Report Examines Mass. Forests and Solar Siting, Offers Path to Net-Zero Goals

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A new report released today by scientists in the Thompson Lab at Harvard Forest and Mass Audubon offers the first-ever comprehensive economic and geospatial analysis of whether Massachusetts can meet its solar goals while protecting its most valuable natural and working lands. 

The report proposes a shift from large-scale, ground-mount solar to solar projects on rooftops, parking lots, and already-developed lands. It offers a way forward for Massachusetts to meet its goal of reaching net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 while simultaneously protecting forests and farmlands.

Botanizing with Ben Goulet-Scott: Combat plant awareness disparity

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As the days shorten and the air cools, it can be easy to forget about the ongoing cycles of our photosynthetic companions. But for Harvard Forest’s Higher Education & Laboratory Coordinator Ben Goulet-Scott, “botanizing” is a year-round endeavor.

Many people think of plants more as a backdrop to life, rather than as a central part of it. Scientists and educators call this phenomenon plant awareness disparity – a widespread cognitive bias that leads people to underestimate the diversity and importance of plants. Botanizing is spending time alongside plants in order to observe and appreciate them as living organisms. As Ben says, it’s “like birding, but with subjects that stay in place.”

Two researchers in the woods peer closely at ferns using hand lenses

While earning their PhDs in Harvard’s Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Ben and Jacob S. Suissa co-founded Let’s Botanize, an educational non-profit that combats the climate and biodiversity crises by spreading curiousity, knowledge, and appreciation of plants. (Check them out on Instagram! @LetsBotanize)

Ben and Jacob recently discussed their work in The Conversation, where they shared ways to engage with a changing planet. “Botanizing is one simple way to inspire change in other aspects of our lives that prioritizes sustainability,” the authors write. “Plants are everywhere and don’t move, so this can be done in virtually any setting, including your windowsill or sidewalk.”

Harvard Forest Welcomes New Cohort of Bullard Fellows

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Harvard Forest is pleased to welcome six new Bullard Fellows into the community this fall. Researchers will investigate topics including local adaptations of red oak, native grass restoration, and forest responses in conflict-affected areas of Sudan. A full description of our Fellows’ great work can be found by visiting our Current Bullard Fellowship Recipients page. 

Established in 1962, the Bullard Charles Bullard Fellowship program supports advanced research and study by persons who show promise of making important contributions, either as scholars or administrators, to forestry defined in its broadest sense as the human use and study of forested environments.