Over the past few decades, forests in the eastern U.S. have changed in response to changes in the climate. A recent study describes how as climate alters forests, those same forests then have an effect on the climate.
The Southeast has generally gotten drier, said Jeremy Lichstein, assistant professor of biology at the University of Florida, and forests here have responded.
“There’s been a shift toward drought-tolerant tree species, which tend to be slow-growing,” he says. “The species that grow faster but are not drought-tolerant have become less common.”
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