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Analyzing climate elements, forest decline, and forest fires in drought-prone areas of Macedonia. Study on desertification vulnerability and vegetation deterioration.
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University “Sv. Kiril i Metodij” - Faculty of Forestry bul. ”Alexandar Makedonski“ bb. 1000 Skopje, Web site: http://www.sf.ukim.edu.mk e-mail: blinkov@ukim.edu.mk Drought and forest decline in the region vulnerable to desertification in Republic of Macedonia (preliminary results) Mila Miladinovic, Forest engineer Ivan Blinkov, Associate Professor Nikola Nikolov, Associate Professor
Objectives of the work • analizys of climate elements and climate changes • changes of climate elements in desertification vulnerable areas (1991-2000) • forest decline (as a consequence of drought) • forest fires
Method of work • collecting meteorological data; • collecting data for forest decline; • collecting data for forest fires; • climatic data processing (comparison 1991-00 with 51-90); • calculation of climatic parameters related to desertification: rainfall factor, aridity index RVD; • overlay (crossed) analysis.
Climate elements Basic data: • 32 gauge stations in RM • period of observing 1951-1990 (1991-2000) - precipitations, temperature, PET • Df – rain factor (by Lang) • Climate qualification (by Grachanin) • Is – drought index (by De Martone) Estimated: • Cd – coeff. of desertification (Aridity index) by UN CCD methodology) • climate changes 1991-2000 >> 1951-90
4 regions – arid climate 10 regions – semiarid climate Region Vulnerable to Desertification ?????? Preliminary Delineation (Mukaetov et al.)
Changes of precipitation and temperature in the period 1991-2000
Long term dry period 1987-2000 and forest decline • During the dry period 1987-2000, trees weakened physiologically, so it decreased forest health i.e., increased appearance of pest and diseases. • There are two groups of reasons for the deterioration and loss of vegetation. The first ones are the natural reasons, and second ones are the human induced reasons. • Maybe the prime problem in RM was the drought period, so it caused deterioration of vegetation conditions and decreased resistance to pests and diseases.
FOREST DECLINE MONITORING • There are some researches carried out on 3 experimental plots about forest die-back in oak stands according to methodology recommended by IPC Forest (Nikolov N. et al.). • Visual observing and estimation of the trees condition and their classification in 5 categories by % of losses of leaf mass • Visual observing and estimation of trees with DRY top • Only one of these experimental plots is located in the RVD i.e. in region of Kavadarci.
Forest decline Legend: I class - % of trees with loss of leaves < 10 %; II class - % of trees with loss of leaves 10-25 %; III class - % of trees with loss of leaves 25-60 %; IV class - % of trees with loss of leaves >60%; V class – dead trees
FOREST FIRES - average – 6048 ha/y year 2000 - 37 929 ha (3.8% of whole forest fund)
Consequences of losses of forest coverage • Increase of erosion • Disturbance of the water regime – flash floods.. • Mechanical pollution of the water • Finally >>>> desert formations
Sheet erosion, deep erosion, mixed erosion in Central Macedonia..
CONCLUSIONS • As it was mentioned above, there was long term dry period in Republic of Macedonia in the period 1987-2000. According to researches (Blinkov, Cukaliev) one part of RM is vulnerable to desertification. Data analyzes for the period 1991-2000 of the climatic parameters (P and T) are showing mean decrease of the precipitation and increase of the temperature in the region vulnerable to desertification.
Consequences for the vegetation cover are present in that period. There are researches in some localities in RM (about forest die-back) and research in one locality in the region vulnerable to desertification which shows extreme vegetation vitality decrease • Improvement of the hydrological situation cause slow revitalization of the ecosystem, but it needs long time to reach the previous condition. • Forest fires are the other factor which generates desertification processes. It was estimated mathematically the relation between forest fires and precipitations. Results show very strong correlation.
Scenario IS92 for Climate Changes – year 2075 precipitation decrease up to -25% summer temperature increase +2,5oC • These issues need more future researches because preliminary analyzes show tendency of worsening of the native vegetation during the drought period.
Blagodaram na vnimanieto Thank you for your attention