Increasing canopy mortality affects the future demographic structure of Europe's forests

Increasing tree mortality can have pervasive impacts on forest dynamics. Yet, large-scale trends in tree mortality and their effects on forest demography remain poorly quantified despite the important role of forest demography for forest carbon pools and biodiversity. Analyzing satellite data at 19,896 plots, we here show that canopy mortality in 35 European countries increased from 1985 to 2018 (+1.5% ± 0.28% yr−1). Using simulations, we...