In rural areas, nitrate concentrations in surface waters most often originate from the leaching of excess N fertilizer in agricultural lands, whereas forested catchments often have good water quality. However, Douglas-fir plantations may induce nitrogen cycle unbalances which may lead to an excess of nitrate production in the soil. We hypothesize that the excess of production of nitrate in the soil and nitrate leaching to streamwater is greater in catchments planted with Douglas fir. We used paired catchments in both France and Luxembourg with different land covers (Douglas-fir, Spruce, Deciduous, Grassland and clearcut) which were monitored over a 3-5 year period in order to assess the effect of Douglas-fir plantations on the chemical composition of surface water. Nitrate concentration in the soil and groundwater were also monitored. The results show that nitrate concentrations in streams draining Douglas-fir catchments were two to ten times higher than in streams draining other land covers, but were similar to the clearcut catchment. Nitrate concentrations under Douglas-fir in groundwater (up to 50 mg L-1) and in the soil were also higher than under all other land covers. Soil nitrate concentration was related to stream nitrate concentration. This suggests that soil processes, through excessive nitrate production under Douglas-fir, are driving the nitrate concentration in the stream water and our hypothesis of a transfer of a fairly large proportion of this excessive production from the soil to the stream is supported. This study also shows that nitrate concentrations in surface and ground waters in rural areas could also originate from Douglas fir forested catchments. The impact of Douglas-fir is nevertheless reduced downstream through a dilution effect: mixing tree species at the catchment scale could thus be a solution to mitigate the effect of Douglas-fir on nitrate concentration in surface waters.

Identifying populations within tree species potentially adapted to future climatic conditions is an important requirement for reforestation and assisted migration programmes. Such populations can be identified either by empirical response functions based on correlations of quantitative traits with climate variables or by climate envelope models that compare the climate of seed sources and potential growing areas. In the present study, we analyzed the intraspecific variation in climate growth response of Douglas-fir planted within the non-analogous climate conditions of Central and continental Europe. With data from 50 common garden trials, we developed Universal Response Functions (URF) for tree height and mean basal area and compared the growth performance of the selected best performing populations with that of populations identified through a climate envelope approach. Climate variables of the trial location were found to be stronger predictors of growth performance than climate variables of the population origin. Although the precipitation regime of the population sources varied strongly none of the precipitation related climate variables of population origin was found to be significant within the models. Overall, the URFs explained more than 88% of variation in growth performance. Populations identified by the URF models originate from western Cascades and coastal areas of Washington and Oregon and show significantly higher growth performance than populations identified by the climate envelope approach under both current and climate change scenarios. The URFs predict decreasing growth performance at low and middle elevations of the case study area, but increasing growth performance on high elevation sites. Our analysis suggests that population recommendations based on empirical approaches should be preferred and population selections by climate envelope models without considering climatic constrains of growth performance should be carefully appraised before transferring populations to planting locations with novel or dissimilar climate.

The insect growth regulator tebufenozide (MIMIC 2LV) was tested to examine its impact on the Douglas-fir tussock moth, Orgyia pseudotsugata (McDunnough) (Lepidoptera: Lymantriidae). Laboratory tests gave an estimated concentration of 1.26 ppm of the compound to achieve 50% population mortality (LC50) for second-instar O. pseudotsugata. At the highest concentration tested, tebufenozide resulted in significant larval mortality within 7 d with an estimated time to 50% population mortality (LT50) of 6.3 d. A field comparison oftebufenozide with diflubenzuron (Dimilin 4L) and Bacillus thurengiensis var. kurstaki (Btk, FORAY 48B) was also conducted. There was no significant difference in larval mortality within field plots that were treated with diflubenzuron (42.4%) or Btk (44.8%). Larval mortality in the tebufenozide-treated plots (56.8%) was also similar to the mortality in the diflubenzuron and Btk treatments. All three treatments resulted in more larval mortality than that measured in untreated controlplots (11.2%). Both tebufenozide and diflubenzuron treatments resulted in significantly more mortality (55.0% and 40.0%, respectively) to larvae-fed treated foliage 3 wk after application than was measured for larvae-fed foliage from untreated trees (11.0%). There was no significant difference among the treatments in the percentage of host trees in the overstory that sustained >25% defoliation, and all three treatments resulted in less defoliation than was measured in the control plots. There was no significant difference among the treatments in the percentage of host trees in the understory that sustained >25% defoliation.

Not all disease activity causes an impact. Not all impacts are negative. The aim of this study was to examine a method that could conceptually specify when impacts occur and that could quantify both negative and positive disease impacts. For this study, dwarf mistletoe ( Arceuthobium douglasi) of Douglas fir ( Pseudotsuga menziesii) in southwestern Oregon was used as a case study. The method uses six variables for forest growth, mortality, and stand structure, and six categorical disease severity scores. The impact model displays stands as points in multidimensional scaling space, where relative position is determined by values of the six stand variables. Positions in this two-dimensional space change when stand characteristics change. Differences associated with disease severity could be traced as trajectories, and impact was quantified using the length and direction of these trajectories. This multivariate impact assessment method was contrasted to impact assessments based on single variables. Methods based on multiple variables offer a useful way of characterizing impact on multiple objectives. The model indicates that dwarf mistletoe has positive, negative, and neutral impacts and that these could be illustrated and quantified using this method.