how do forest play a role in maintaing the water cycle
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Answer:
Forests help control the water cycle by regulating precipitation, evaporation and flows. Layers of forest canopy, branches and roots can store and release water vapor, which controls rainfall. Forests can also help reduce the impacts of flood from storms by blocking and slowing down the flow of runoff.
Forests are a critical cog in the global water cycle: Trees pull water from the ground and release it into the atmosphere as vapor through pores in their leaves in a process called transpiration, which can drive temperatures and rainfall across the globe. Forests are also dynamic ecosystems, with both natural events, such as pest infestations and droughts, and anthropogenic activities like logging potentially causing dramatic changes in forest structure. Despite the important roles forests play, the relationship between forest structure and the global water cycle is not well understood.
To help fill gaps in our understanding of this relationship, Aron et al. compared two forest sites in Michigan to find out how disturbances in forest structure can influence water transport from the land surface to the atmosphere.