At SITES Svartberget Research Station, as spring returns, the traps for the European Spruce Bark Beetle (Ips typographus) have been again set around the Vindeln area.
Are you interested in participating in a coordinated mesocosm experiment that investigates effects of terrestrial inputs of mineral particles on carbon and nutrient transformations, food web dynamics and metabolism across lakes?
From November 10–12, the SITES Secretariat, Station Managers, Thematic Program Leads, and representatives from all SITES stations gathered in Umeå for a three-day meeting dedicated to collaboration, knowledge sharing, and strategic planning.
The meeting opened with updates from the nine SITES research stations, highlighting ongoing projects, recent developments, and future plans across the stations.
The unmanaged forested ICP Integrated Monitoring site Aneboda, which is associated with Asa Research Station, was severely affected by bark beetles after a relatively low impact of the storm Gudrun in 2005. The bark beetles killed almost all spruces larger than about 10 cm in diameter over the subsequent years.
As part of her PhD project at the Department of Forest Biomaterials and Technology at SLU, Linnea Larsson is leading innovative field trials to explore how wood ash, derived from forest residues, can be used more efficiently and sustainably in Swedish forestry. While wood ash is already returned to forests in southern Sweden to some extent, it holds potential for maintaining soil productivity after whole-tree harvesting and may enhance tree growth on certain sites.
With its 25 meters, the new scaffolding tower is replacing the old mast, which had become overgrown by forest. The new tower will be much easier to access for future maintenance. Alongside the tower, both the sensors and the logger-system have been updated.
From January 28 to 31, a joint data retreat was held at Asa Research Station, bringing together members of the SITES Secretariat and colleagues from Asa and Bolmen. The focus was on publishing new data collected within the SITES Water Program to the SITES Data Portal.
Several key updates are now available:
Are you interested in conducting mesocosm experiments on lakes? SITES AquaNet provides a standardized infrastructure for running mesocosm studies across various lakes. This system features floating platforms with mesocosm enclosures, automatic sensors linked to a data-logging system, and handheld sensors for precise measurements. In this video you can find more information about SITES AquaNet!
In 2025, a government evaluation is planned to assess the current hunting periods for various small mammal species (SEPA). To support this effort with updated data and insights on the reproductive periods of these species, a research program titled “Reproductive timing in relation to hunting season in small mammals” was launched this year. The program includes several sub-projects (post docs), each using different methods and focusing on different species.
SITES provides users access to long-term monitoring of forests, through the Unit for Field-based Forest Research at SLU, connected to both SITES Asa and Svartberget Research Stations, which has several decades of data.