This past January, Dr. Lawrence Tanner (Associate McDevitt Chair in Biology), Morgan Nivison’15 (Environmental Science Systems), and Megan Wilckens ’15 (Environmental Science Systems) traveled to the Monteverde Institute (a private educational-research organization) in Costa Rica to study the carbon dynamics of reforestation in the mountain cloud forests. The Monteverde Institute provided them with assistance in the field and access to their data.
Tanner, Nivison, and Wilckens are trying to determine how long it takes for mature forests that have been cut down to recover all of the carbon lost from the forest and soil when the forest is allowed to regrow. While in Costa Rica, they calculated the mass of all of the trees (by measuring their height and diameter) and the amount of carbon in the soil (by analysis of soil samples) in areas of mature forest, clear-cut land, and secondary forests of known age. Nivison, who was responsible for the soil carbon portion of the project, will analyze the 300 samples collected; Wilckens, who did the tree measurements, will be responsible for calculating the carbon mass for approximately 1600 trees measured. The results of their work will be submitted for publication and presented at the 9th Annual Le Moyne College Student Scholars Day held on April 11, 2014.
The McDevitt Center 