After years of technological development and its important achievements to make our life easier and more comfortable, human society is going to face one of the most difficult challenges of the last century: to stabilize the concentra tion levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere to prevent harmful effects on the climate system. Through a delicate balance between photosynthesis and respiration, terres trial ecosystems, and in particular forests, are today thought to take up a sig nificant part of the carbon dioxide emissions in the atmosphere, sometimes called the "terrestrial carbon sink". However, the location, magnitude, and vulnerability of the carbon dioxide sink of the terrestrial biota are still uncer tain. The suite of traditional tools in an ecologist's toolbox for studying ecosys tem productivity and carbon balance include leaf cuvettes, whole-plant and soil chambers for gas exchange, and biomass and soil carbon inventories. While each of the cited methods has distinct advantages, they are limited with regards to their ability to measure net carbon dioxide exchange of the whole ecosystem across a variety of time scales. This book present a compendium of results of a European project (EURO FLUX), funded by the European Commission through its fourth framework program, aiming to elucidate the role of forests in continental carbon balance.

This book focuses on fluxes of energy, carbon dioxide and matter in and above a Central European spruce forest. The transition from a forest affected by acid rain into a heterogeneous forest occurred as a result of wind throw, bark beetles and climate change. Scientific results obtained over the last 20 years at the FLUXNET site DE-Bay (Waldstein-Weidenbrunnen) are shown together with methods developed at the site, including the application of footprint models for data-quality analysis, the coupling between the trunk space and the atmosphere, the importance of the Damköhler number for trace gas studies, and the turbulent conditions at a forest edge. In addition to the many experimental studies, the book also applies model studies such as higher-order closure models, Large-Eddy Simulations, and runoff models for the catchment and compares them with the experimental data. Moreover, by highlighting processes in the atmosphere it offers insights into the functioning of the ecosystem as a whole. It is of interest to ecologists, micrometeorologists and ecosystem modelers.

Forest ecosystems represent a major type ofland use in Germanyand in Europe. They provide a number of functions, or ecosystem services, beneficial to humans, namely biomass production, regulation of the water- and energy cyde, C and N sequestration, erosion control, recreation, and they act as habitat for numerous species. The stability of forest ecosystems in Europe as influenced by the deposition of air pollutants has been a matter of debate for more than 20 years. Besides atmospheric deposition, other environmental conditions affecting forest ecosystems, such as temperature, CO content of the atmosphere 2 and precipitation, have significantly changed in the past and continue to change in the future. Quantifying and predicting the effects of these changes on ecosys tem functioning are achallenge to ecosystem research and also a requirement to establish sustainable use of forest ecosystems in the future. This book summarizes results of long-term, interdisciplinary ecosystem research conducted in two forested catchments and coordinated at the Bayreuth Institute of Terrestrial Ecosystem Research (BITÖK), University of Bayreuth, Germany. It does not aim to summarize all the research of BITÖ K in the past decade, which would go far beyond the studies in these two catch ments. Instead, we concentrate here on the long-term developments in the biogeochemistry of carbon and mineral elements and on the water cyde, at both the plot and the catchment scale.

The protective function of forests for water quality and water-related hazards, as well as adequate water supplies for forest ecosystems in Europe, are potentially at risk due to changing climate and changing land-management practices. Water budgets of forest ecosystems are heavily dependent on climate and forest structure. The latter is determined by the management measures applied in the forestry sector. Various developments of forest management strategies, imposed on a background of changing climate, are considered in assessing the overall future of forest–water interactions in Europe. Synthesizing recent research on the interactions of forest management and the water regime of forests in Europe and beyond, the book makes an important contribution to the ongoing dialogue between scientists dealing with different scales of forest-water interactions. This collaborative endeavour, which covers geographic and climatic gradients from Iceland to Israel and from southern Spain to Estonia and Finland, was made possible through the COST Action "Forest Management and the Water Cycle (FORMAN)", which was launched in 2007 (http://www.forestandwater.eu/). The book will be of particular interest to the research community involved in forest ecosystem research and forest hydrology, as well as landscape ecologists and hydrologists in general. It will also provide reference material for forest practitioners and planners in hydrology and land use.

This international rigorously peer-reviewed volume critically synthesizes current knowledge in forest hydrology and biogeochemistry. It is a one-stop comprehensive reference tool for researchers and practitioners in the fields of hydrology, biogeoscience, ecology, forestry, boundary-layer meteorology, and geography. Following an introductory chapter tracing the historical roots of the subject, the book is divided into the following main sections: · Sampling and Novel Approaches · Forest Hydrology and Biogeochemistry by Ecoregion and Forest Type · Hydrologic and Biogeochemical Fluxes from the Canopy to the Phreatic Surface · Hydrologic and Biogeochemical Fluxes in Forest Ecosystems: Effects of Time, Stressors, and Humans The volume concludes with a final chapter that reflects on the current state of knowledge and identifies some areas in need of further research.

Eddy covariance method is a modern high-precision technique for direct measurements of the movement of gases, water vapor, heat, and momentum between the surface and the atmosphere. It is used for measurements of carbon sequestration and emission rates in natural, agricultural, industrial, and urban environments, atmospheric exchange rates of greenhouse gases, direct mea­surements of evapotranspirative water loss, heat exchange, turbulence rates, and momentum fluxes. The wide range of applications includes numerous fundamental and applied sciences, regulatory and industrial monitoring, multiple aspects of agricultural management, as well as carbon trading and offsets, corporate sustainability and neutrality, among many others. The book “Eddy Covariance Method for Scientific, Regulatory, and Commercial Applications” has been created to familiarize the reader with the general theoretical principles, requirements, applica­tions, planning, processing, and analysis steps of the eddy covariance method. It is intended to assist readers in furthering their understanding of the method and provide refer­ences such as academic textbooks, flux network guidelines, and journal papers. In particular, it is designed to help scientific, industrial, agricultural, and regulatory projects and monitoring programs with experiment design and field deployment of the eddy covariance method. Some of the topics covered in “Eddy Covariance Method for Scientific, Regulatory, and Commercial Applications” include: · Overview of eddy covariance principles · Planning and design of an eddy covariance experiment · Implementation of an eddy covariance experiment · Processing and analysis of eddy covariance data · Networking multiple flux stations · Alternative flux methods · Useful resources, training and knowledge base · Example of planning, design and implementation of a comprehensive automated flux station

Evapotranspiration is a very complex phenomenon, comprising different aspects and processes (hydrological, meteorological, physiological, soil, plant and others). Farmers, agriculture advisers, extension services, hydrologists, agrometeorologists, water management specialists and many others are facing the problem of evapotranspiration. This book is dedicated to further understanding of the evapotranspiration problems, presenting a broad body of experience, by reporting different views of the authors and the results of their studies. It covers aspects from understandings and concepts of evapotranspiration, through methodology of calculating and measuring, to applications in different fields, in which evapotranspiration is an important factor. The book will be of benefit to scientists, engineers and managers involved in problems related to meteorology, climatology, hydrology, geography, agronomy and agricultural water management. We hope they will find useful material in this collection of papers.