Climate‐driven tree growth and mortality in the Black Forest, Germany: Long‐term observations

Episodic tree mortality can be caused by various reasons. This study describes climate‐driven tree mortality and tree growth in the Black Forest mountain range in Germany. It is based on a 68‐year consistent data series describing the annual mortality of all trees growing in a forest area of almost 250 thousand ha. The study excludes mortality caused by storm, snow and ice, and fire. The sequence of the remaining mortality, the so‐called “desiccated trees,” is analyzed and compared with the sequence of the climatic water balance during the growing season and the annual radial growth of Norway spruce in the Black Forest. The annual radial growth series covers 121 years and the climatic water balance series 140 years. These unique time series enable a quantitative assessment of multidecadal drought and heat impacts on growth and mortality of forest trees on a regional spatial scale. Data compiled here suggest that the mortality of desiccated trees in the Black Forest during the last 68 ye..., The collection of the data is described in the article., The data are stored in a zip-file. The data format of the individual files is csv-format. The read-me file is in md-format. , The Data stored in the attached zip-file refer to the GCB-publication: \"Climate-driven tree growth and mortality in the Black Forest, Germany—Long-term observations\" by Heinrich Spiecker and Hans-Peter Kahle; first published: 08 August 2023; https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.16897.The files contain the list of data used in each of the figures 2 to 7.

File Spiecker-Kahle-2023-GCB-Figure-2.csv
Climatic water balance during the growing season (May–September) of the current and the four preceding years (CWB) according to Thornthwaite and Mather (1955) in mm. The five highest-ranked years and the five lowest-ranked years are marked with blue or red figures, respectively. From 1881 to 2020 CWB shows a significant negative trend (dotted line). Missing value code: n/a.

File Spiecker-Kahle-2023-GCB-Figure-3.csv
Time series of climatic water balance during the growing season May–September of the current and the four preceding years 1950–2020 in mm (line, y-axis inverted) plotted together with the ann...