Photo Credit: Seth Bigelow, The Jones Center at Ichauway
Key projected climate change impacts that the project team considered for The Jones Center at Ichauway include:
- Increased temperatures and drought severity
- Changing precipitation amounts and extreme weather events
- Increased insects, pathogens, and invasive species
- Reduced ability to use prescribed fire as a management tool and potentially more wildfires
Climate change will present challenges and opportunities for accomplishing the management objectives of The Jones Center at Ichauway, including:
Challenges
- Altered vulnerability to future climatic conditions in pine plantations and hardwood forests
- Increased mortality rates in pine species from drought
- Increased abundance of hardwood stems of all size classes
Opportunities
- Longleaf pine is highly resilient to drought and insect-induced mortality and may be suitable on a wider range of sites under projected climate change