"Ecosystem processes at the watershed scale: Evolution of forest spatial
patterns”
Long term measurements in experimental catchments in the Coweeta Long Term
Ecological Research site show generalizable gradients in forest canopy conditions and
ecosystem processes. We hypothesize that these observations manifest catchment scale
dependency of the forest canopy along topographically defined flowpaths, resulting in
adjustment and co-evolution of hydrologic, ecological and geomorphic systems. Further,
we hypothesize that this spatial adjustment evolves patterns that maximize landscape
level water use, net primary productivity and potentially other ecosystem processes, and
set a benchmark to contrast more disturbed and managed ecosystem patterns. We use
a set of long term measurements of water and carbon stores and fluxes, along with a
transient, spatially distributed modeling framework to explore these hypotheses in a set
of the monitored Coweeta catchments, and discuss potential applications to restoration
design and potential, realizable value of ecosystem services.
