Data from: The distribution of tree biomass carbon within the pacific coastal temperate rainforest, a disproportionally carbon dense forest

Spatially explicit global estimates of forest carbon storage are typically
coarsely scaled. While useful, these estimates do not account for the
variability and distribution of carbon at management scales. We asked how
climate, topography, and disturbance regimes interact across and within
geopolitical boundaries to influence tree biomass carbon, using the
perhumid region of the Pacific Coastal Temperate Rainforest, an
infrequently disturbed carbon dense landscape, as a test case. We
leveraged permanent sample plots in southeast Alaska and coastal British
Columbia and used multiple quantile regression forests and generalized
linear models to estimate tree biomass carbon stocks and the effects of
topography, climate, and disturbance regimes. We estimate tree biomass
carbon stocks are either 211 (SD = 163) Mg C ha-1 or 218 (SD = 169) Mg C
ha-1. Natural disturbance regimes had no correlation with tree biomass but
logging decreased tree biomass carbon and the effect diminished with
increasing time since logging. Despite accounting for 0.3% of global
forest area, this forest stores between 0.63% - 1.07% of global
aboveground forest carbon as aboveground live tree biomass. The disparate
impact of logging and natural disturbance regimes on tree biomass carbon
suggests a mismatch between current forest management and disturbance
history.