Forests in the Southwest US face 100 percent mortality risk by 2100

A new study suggests that millions of trees in California are at a risk of dying because of the sustained drought-like condition. Another study suggests that the condition is not just restricted to California, as trees in the entire US southwest are at a similar risk.

The first study conducted by Gregory Asner and his colleagues from the Carnegie Institution for Science in Stanford, California found that nearly 58 million trees in California, including junipers, pines and fir, suffer from losses that are extremely threatening to their long-term existence.

The team's findings were based on the analysis of the impact of California's four-year-long drought. The team used airborne, laser-guided imaging instruments to study the impact. The team then compared the results with the satellite data for 2011.

The intention of the researchers, as described in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, was to assess the level of water content in the canopy. The team found that almost all 88 million trees spread across 10.6 million hectares suffered loss of canopy water between 2011 and 2015.

In the second study, a team of US researchers devised a model to estimate the impact of global warming on the 11 national forests of the American Southwest. This area includes California, Colorado, Texas, Utah, Arizona and parts of New Mexico.

The study of the impact of global warming on forests up to year 2100 yielded striking results. Predicting a massive mortality for conifers of the region, the study results, published in the journal Nature Climate Change, suggest that nearly 72 percent of the evergreen forests in the area will be lost by 2050. In addition, there is a chance that 100 percent of the forests will die by 2100.

“This region of the US has beautiful, old forests with historic trees like Ponderosa pine that you don’t find in many other places. A treeless Southwest would be a major change not only to the landscape, but to the overall ecosystem,” said researcher Sara Rauscher of the University of Delaware, reports Climate News Network.