Evaluating drought response of Southern Cape Indigenous Forests,South Africa,using MODIS data

Indigenous forests in South Africa cover less than 0.5% of the total land area but are a valued resource under threat from fragmentation, fires, exploitation, and climate change. The largest indigenous forest complex is located along the southern coast of the Western Cape Province. This complex is made up of sub-forests distinguished by different structural and edaphoclimatic attributes. It has been hypothesized that these sub-forests exhibit different resistance to stressors, such as drought. A time series of MODIS 250 m enhanced vegetation index (EVI) data were used to characterize the foliage condition of the three distinctive sub-forests before, during, and after a severe drought in 2009. The goal was to determine how these sub-forests responded to this disturbance. EVI anomalies for the drought and post-drought periods were calculated using annual median EVI values, since removal of outliers based on quality control flags that accompany the MODIS products or noise-filtering techniques proved to be ineffective. Results of the study indicated that pre-drought foliage density EVI was not controlled by differences in water availability, but may have been due to other edaphoclimatic or structural attributes. Maximum foliage loss occurred one year after the driest year, indicating the cumulative effects of drought stress on forest production and retention of foliage. The hypothesized stress resistance capacity of the three sub-forests was found to correspond to their rate of post-drought recovery. There is a need to tie these satellite observations of forest drought response to ground observations of forest condition, growth, and specific site attributes.