Beech tree ring data for ForeSight: Predicting and monitoring drought-linked forest growth decline across Europe (NE/S010041/1)

Abstract

We aim to utilise the relationship between European Beech tree growth and various environmental factors, including climate, to monitor and forecast the decline in forest growth linked to drought across Europe. Tree inter-annual growth (dendroecology, ring width) is measured in our research. We sampled European Beech tree cores at 12 sites of European beech in Bulgaria, Albania, Kosovo, and Spain in late 2019 to fill the climatic gaps that European Beech Tree Ring Network (EBTRN) has not well covered at the hot and dry European distribution edges. At least 15 trees per site and two cores per tree were sampled for those 12 sites. We processed the new tree cores followed by the standard dendrology. They were first air-dried in the shade and ventilated space, then mounted onto the carrier before sanded by sandpaper from raw to fine grits (80, 120, 300, 600, 1200). All cores were scanned into 2400 PPI images, for the CDendro measurements, with a precision of 0.01mm. For each site, all measurements are cross dated virtually and statistically, and COFECH is used to control the crossdating quality.