Aim Natural disturbances are intensifying under global change, yet a global synthesis of their effects on forest structure and composition remains lacking. We aimed to assess the prevalence of structural versus compositional changes and to identify common post‐disturbance reorganisation pathways across forest biomes. Time Period 1980–2023. Location Global. Taxa Studied Forest tree species. Methods We conducted a systematic lit...

Central Europe has been a hotspot of forest disturbance during 2018–2020, with large pulses of tree mortality from drought and bark beetles. Post‐disturbance recovery is crucial for forest resilience and the continued provision of ecosystem services. We surveyed 849 plots in disturbance hotspots across 10 Central European countries to assess the state of early (3–5 years) post‐disturbance tree regeneration. Our specific object...

Purpose of Review Forests produce timber, mitigate climate change and provide important habitats; yet their capacity to provide these services under rapid global change is uncertain. “Closer-to-nature” forest management (CNFM) has been proposed by the EU Forest Strategy as a way to reconcile competing demands on forests while enhancing their resilience, but experiences with its implementation remain limited. We synthesized exp...

Increasing forest disturbances caused by climate change will present challenges for the resilience of wood value chains. In recent decades, Europe has experienced a rise in forest disturbances, including storms, droughts, and bark beetle infestations, which have a significant impact on harvesting practices and lead to reduced roundwood prices. This presents significant challenges for forest owners. A lack of profitability may...

Ongoing shifts in climate and land use have altered interactions between trees and insect herbivores, changing biotic disturbance regimes. However, as these changes are complex and vary across host species, insect taxa, and feeding guilds, they remain poorly understood. We compiled annual records of forest insect disturbance from 15 countries in temperate and boreal Europe, spanning the period from 2000 to 2022. The dataset co...

Aim Global change alters many ecological processes simultaneously. Yet, the interactive and compound effects of these changes remain difficult to quantify. Here, we addressed the question of how changes in disturbance and regeneration processes interactively alter temperate forest landscapes across three continents. Location Temperate forests of the Northern Hemisphere. Time Period 21st century. Major Taxa Studied Trees. Metho...

Climate change has profound impacts on forest ecosystem dynamics and could lead to the emergence of novel ecosystems via changes in species composition, forest structure, and potentially a complete loss of tree cover. Disturbances fundamentally shape those dynamics: the prevailing disturbance regime of a region determines the inherent variability of a system, and its climate‐mediated change could accelerate forest transformati...

Aim Natural disturbances are key drivers of forest ecosystem dynamics and are highly sensitive to global change. Despite their importance, central disturbance characteristics remain unknown for many forests worldwide. Here, we quantified an important component of the forest disturbance regime—the distribution of patch sizes—in strictly protected areas by asking: (i) How are patch sizes of naturally occurring disturbances distr...

Global change impacts on disturbances can strongly compromise the capacity of forests to provide ecosystem services to society. In addition, many ecosystem services in Europe are simultaneously provided by forests, emphasizing the importance of multifunctionality in forest ecosystem assessments. To address disturbances in forest ecosystem policies and management, spatially explicit risk analyses that consider multiple disturba...

Aim The sweeping transformation of the biosphere by humans over the last millennia leaves only limited windows into its natural state. Much of the forests that dominated temperate and southern boreal regions have been lost and those that remain typically bear a strong imprint of forestry activities and past land‐use change, which have changed forest age structure and composition. Here, we ask how would the dynamics, structure...