Marganai forest (Italy)

Marganai forest (Italy)

The state-owned forest of Marganai, managed by FORESTAS, in the Sulcis area, occupies 3,650 hectares of the territory of Domusnovas, Fluminimaggiore and Iglesias and it is also part of the park that unites Monte Linas and Montimannu. The mountainous massif, made of limestone and schistic rock and among the most ancient in Italy, has uneven peaks that range from two hundred to one thousand meters in height, covered by lush forests of holm oaks, which are original, and pines, planted during the reforestation. Next to it, there is dense Mediterranean scrub: olive, mastic, wild olive, and strawberry tree.

The Marganai forest is a Long-Term Ecosystem Research (LTER) Italian site and a European Site of Community Importance (Natura 2000) managed by FORESTAS. The vegetation is mainly composed by Quercus Ilex trees and the soil depth varies between 10 cm and 50 cm. Historical data of temperature and rainfall are available since 1922 at 1 day resolution. Runoff of the Fluminimaggiore basin (area of 83 km2) is available since 1925.

A 7 m micrometeorological tower has been installed in November 2021. The micrometeorological tower includes a CSAT3 (Campbell) sonic anemometer and a Licor-LI7500 CO2/H2O infrared gas analyzer at 7 m above ground and it is equipped for the measurement of state variables such as: radiation (NR1, Hukseflux), precipitation (PMB20/2, CAE) air temperature, and relative humidity (HygroVUE, Campbell), soil moisture (CS616, Campbell).  

Eddy- covariance tower at the Marganai site -Italy-