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Cited by 332Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics StudiesForest ecology and managementForest Management and Policy

Four Centuries of Change in Northeastern United States Forests

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Thompson, Jonathan R., Carpenter, Dunbar N., Cogbill, Charles V., Foster, David R.·2013·PLoS ONE
DOI 10.1371/journal.pone.0072540PMC PMC3762820
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Abstract

The northeastern United States is a predominately-forested region that, like most of the eastern U.S., has undergone a 400-year history of intense logging, land clearance for agriculture, and natural reforestation. This setting affords the opportunity to address a major ecological question: How similar are today's forests to those existing prior to European colonization? Working throughout a nine-state region spanning Maine to Pennsylvania, we assembled a comprehensive database of archival land-survey records describing the forests at the time of European colonization. We compared these records to modern forest inventory data and described: (1) the magnitude and attributes of forest compositional change, (2) the geography of change, and (3) the relationships between change and environmental factors and historical land use. We found that with few exceptions, notably the American chestnut, the same taxa that made up the pre-colonial forest still comprise the forest today, despite ample opportunities for species invasion and loss. Nonetheless, there have been dramatic shifts in the relative abundance of forest taxa. The magnitude of change is spatially clustered at local scales (<125 km) but exhibits little evidence of regional-scale gradients. Compositional change is most strongly associated with the historical extent of agricultural clearing. Throughout the region, there has been a broad ecological shift away from late successional taxa, such as beech and hemlock, in favor of early- and mid-successional taxa, such as red maple and poplar. Additionally, the modern forest composition is more homogeneous and less coupled to local climatic controls.

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71 of 71 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

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Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • Native canopy tree density was stable or decreasing for all but two parks.

    “Native canopy tree density was stable or decreasing for all but two parks, as is typical of middle-aged eastern deciduous forests (Thompson et al., 2013).”

    From Overabundant deer and invasive plants drive widespread regeneration debt in eastern United States national parks (2023) · cites this paper as Thompson et al., 2013

    The citation appears to support the claim that stable or decreasing native canopy-tree density is typical of middle-aged eastern deciduous forests, rather than the citing authors’ finding about their parks. The source’s Results and Discussion report changes in species’ relative abundance across northeastern towns, but the passages found do not address canopy-tree density trends in middle-aged forests (searched: canopy-tree density, stand age, and parks). (LLM, conf=0.74)

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Cites

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Research works printed but not linked: 6

  1. [3]Foster DR, Aber JD (2004) Forest in time: Environmental consequences of 1000 years of change in New England. New Haven: Yale University Press.
  2. [6]Irland LC (1999) The Northeast's changing forests. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
  3. [12]Foley JA, Ramankutty N, Leff B, Gibbs HK (2007) Global land use changes. In: Kling MD, Parkinson CL, Partington KC, Williams RG, editors. Our changing planet: A view from space. New York: Cambridge University Press. 262–265.
  4. [17]Sears PB (1925) Th natural vegetation of Ohio. I, A map of the virgin forest. Ohio Journal of Science 25: 139– 149.
  5. [19]Whitney G, DeCant J (2001) Government land office surveys and other early surveys. The Historical Ecology Handbook. Washington, DC: Island Press. 147–172.
  6. [34]Glitzenstein J, Canham CD, McDonnell MJ, Streng D (1990) Effects of environment and land-use history on upland forests of the Cary Arboretum. Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club 117: 106– 122.

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Authors
Thompson, J. R., Carpenter, D. N., Cogbill, C. V., & Foster, D. R.
Affiliations
  • Smithsonian Institution (US)
  • University of Wisconsin–Madison (US)
  • Harvard University (US)
Corresponding author
Thompson, Jonathan R.
ORCID
Venue
PLoS ONE
Publisher
Public Library of Science (PLoS)
Published
2013-09-04
Volume
8
Issue
9
Pages
e72540
ISSN
1932-6203 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1371/journal.pone.0072540
PMC
PMC3762820
OpenAlex
W2130701908
Cited by
331
References
71
Citations by year
2026: 13 · 2025: 29 · 2024: 24 · 2023: 25 · 2022: 42 · 2021: 29 · 2020: 30 · 2019: 29 · 2018: 21 · 2017: 21 · 2016: 26 · 2015: 25 · 2014: 12 · 2013: 3
FWCI
19.77
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • PLoS ONE (publishedVersion, public-domain)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, public-domain)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, public-domain)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Digital Access to Scholarship at Harvard (DASH) (Harvard University) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
  • Smithsonian Digital Repository (Smithsonian Institution) (submittedVersion)
Funders
  • National Science Foundation (0620443)
  • Harvard University
  • U.S. Forest Service
Topics
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Nature and Landscape Conservation › Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Nature and Landscape Conservation › Forest ecology and management
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Forest Management and Policy
Keywords
forest composition change, European colonization, land use history, agricultural clearing, logging, natural reforestation, forest succession, biological invasions, American chestnut, northeastern United States forests, land survey records
MeSH terms
Geography, New England, Trees, Ecosystem

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