The canopy conductance of a boreal aspen forest, Prince Albert National Park, Canada

Annual fluxes of canopy-level heat, water vapour and carbon dioxide were measured using eddy covariance both above the aspen overstory (Populus tremuloides Michx.) and hazelnut understory (Corylus cornuta Marsh.) of a boreal aspen forest (53Ð629 °N 106Ð200 °W). Partitioning of the fluxes between overstory and understory components allowed the calculation of canopy conductance to water vapour for both species. On a seasonal basis, the canopy conductance of the aspen accounted for 70% of the surface conductance, with the latter a strong function of the forest’s leaf area index. On a half-hour basis, the canopy conductance of both species decreased non-linearly as the leaf-surface saturation deficits increased, and was best parameterized and showed similar sensitivities to a modified form of the Ball–Berry–Woodrow index, where relative humidity was replaced with the reciprocal of the saturation deficit. The negative feedback between the forest evaporation and the saturation deficit in the convective boundary layer varied from weak when the forest was at full leaf to strong when the forest was developing or loosing leaves. The coupling between the air at the leaf surface and the convective boundary layer also varied seasonally, with coupling decreasing with increasing leaf area. Compared with coniferous boreal forests, the seasonal changes in leaf area had a unique impact on vegetation–atmosphere interactions. Copyright  2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.