Natural disturbances from bark beetle outbreaks and windthrow increasingly affect Europe's most mature and carbon-rich forests

Besnard, Simon; Viana-Soto, Alba; Hartmann, Henrik; Patacca, Marco; Heinrich, Viola H. A.; Kowalski, Katja; Santoro, Maurizio; De Keersmaecker, Wanda; Van De Kerchove, Ruben; Herold, Martin; Senf, Cornelius

doi:10.5194/bg-23-5983-2026

Articles | Volume 23, issue 17

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-23-5983-2026

© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-23-5983-2026

© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 23, issue 17

Research article

| Highlight paper

|

31 Aug 2026

Research article | Highlight paper |

| 31 Aug 2026

Natural disturbances from bark beetle outbreaks and windthrow increasingly affect Europe's most mature and carbon-rich forests

Simon Besnard, Alba Viana-Soto, Henrik Hartmann, Marco Patacca, Viola H. A. Heinrich, Katja Kowalski, Maurizio Santoro, Wanda De Keersmaecker, Ruben Van De Kerchove, Martin Herold, and Cornelius Senf

Supplement

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-23-5983-2026-supplement

Data sets

Natural disturbances increasingly affect Europe's most mature and carbon-rich forests. S. Besnard et al. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17977435

Global Age Mapping Integration (GAMI) S. Besnard et al. https://doi.org/10.5880/GFZ.1.4.2023.006

ESA Biomass Climate Change Initiative (Biomass\_cci): global datasets of forest above-ground biomass for the years 2007, 2010, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022 M. Santoro and O. Cartus https://doi.org/10.5285/95913ffb6467447ca72c4e9d8cf30501

ForestPaths: European tree genus map W. De Keersmaecker et al. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13341104

Model code and software

simonbesnard1/structshift: first release (Version v202608) S. Besnard https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22115851

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Editorial statement

European forests are an important carbon sink, but this sink and the carbon stocks that these forests contain are at risk from biotic disturbances and extreme events. Besnard and others use observations of forest changes to show that older and more carbon rich forests are disproportionately impacted by these events and are projected to become even more susceptible, emphasizing the role of proactive management to ensure forest resilience and diversity.