Study finds increased biomass in West Africa despite forty year drought
Monday, August 27, 2012 - 07:41
in Biology & Nature
(Phys.org)—Researchers from Ghana and the UK have found that contrary to what might be expected, biomass in West Africa has been increasing during the ongoing forty year drought, leading the trees there to harbor more carbon than has been theorized. The team has been looking at more than 10,000 trees in the area and have found, as they describe in their paper in Ecology Letters, that rather than succumbing to the drought, the area has prospered as the encroachment of more tolerant species has been taking over.