ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. For. Glob. Change
Sec. Forest Hydrology
Hydrological Response to Thinning in Forest Stands: Analysis of Soil Volumetric Water Content and Soil Water Flux
Provisionally accepted
- 1Instituto Nacional de Investigaciones Forestales Agricolas y Pecuarias Centro de Investigacion Regional Norte Centro, Matamoros, Mexico
- 2New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, United States
- 3New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, Socorro, United States
- 4Oregon State University, Corvallis, United States
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Thinning practices have increased to maintain healthy and resilient forests. However, there is a growing concern about the potential effects of thinning on hydrological response. We analyzed the influence of thinning on shallow soil water flux in a mixed conifer forest by comparing paired treated and control plots. Sensors measured soil volumetric water content and soil matric potential at different depths to compute soil water fluxes over five seasons. Additionally, we analyzed soil temperature and soil volumetric water content data. Thinning treatment led to upward soil water flux during the study period (2009-2011), regardless of the season. This was mainly due to differences in soil gradients, possibly associated with an increased soil temperature by as much as 2.65 °C due to increased solar radiation. Although thinning increased upward water flux (< 0.2 mm day⁻¹), it constituted a negligible part of the soil volumetric water content stored in thinned plots, which was 0.15 cm³ cm⁻³ greater, at 35 cm depth, than in control plots. Our findings suggest that thinning can contribute to soil moisture storage even during dry periods, likely stored at the bottom of the soil column on a rock surface. Thinning can have a positive impact on the resilience of forests to droughts and other climate-related stresses.
Keywords: Weathered bedrock, Percolation, Soil moisture storage, matric potential, forest resiliency
Received: 16 Jun 2025; Accepted: 27 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 R. Garduño, Fernald, Newton, VanLeeuwen and Shukla. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Hector R. Garduño, ramirez.hector@inifap.gob.mx
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