Assessing the impact of forest management and climate on a peatland under Scots pine monoculture using a multidisciplinary approach

Assessing the scale, rate and consequences of climate change, manifested primarily by rising average air temperatures and altered precipitation regimes, is a critical challenge in contemporary scientific research. These changes are accompanied by various anomalies and extreme events that negatively impact ecosystems worldwide. Monoculture forests, including Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) monocultures, are particularly vulnerable to these changes due to their homogeneous structure and simplified ecosystem linkages compared to mixed forests, making them more sensitive to extreme events such as insect outbreaks, droughts, fires and strong winds. In the context of global warming, forest fires are becoming extremely dangerous, and the risk of their occurrence increases as average temperatures rise. The situation becomes even more dramatic when fire enters areas of peatlands, as these ecosystems effectively withdraw carbon from the rapid carbon cycle and store it for up to thousands of years. Consequently, peatlands become emitters of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.