Work package 1

In WP1, the aim is to assess how and to what extent forest biodiversity has responded to different past and current canopy disturbance and drought regimes. To answer this question, a pan-continental database of vegetation resurvey data will be compiled. From the forestREplot database, plots will be stratified and pre-selected based on remote sensing and field data along crossed gradients of canopy disturbance and drought. For WP1, we revisited all plots in spring 2025, and perform a resurvey following the recent droughts. Together with a large array of abiotic and biotic environmental data from each of the plots, we are able to quantify how plant species, populations, communities and the entire ecosystem have changed depending on canopy disturbance and drought severity and frequency at the plot level.

The step-change in WP1 is that long-term biodiversity change can be compared from the baseline (1934 to c. 1980s) till the first resurvey (2000s-2010s), and then again following the recent “no-analog” canopy changes and droughts (survey in spring 2025).

In spring 2025, we revisited 186 plots in 19 different regions in Europe. We did an extensive sampling in each plot: measuring the trees, vegetation surveys, soil samples, Kopecky samples, densiometer measurements, height measurements, collection of plants, measuring the height of plants…