Kalan Ickes News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

Clemson, Harvard researchers study long-term hurricane effect on trees

The island of Dominica took a direct hit from Category 5 Hurricane Maria. Nine months afterward, Clemson University researchers found that while 89% percent of trees located in nine previously documented forest stands were damaged, but only 10 percent had immediately died. The most common damage was stem snapping and major branch damage. The damage with the highest rates of mortality were uprooting and being crushed by a neighboring tree. Large individual trees and species with lower wood density were susceptible to snapping, uprooting and mortality. Those on steeper slopes were more prone to...