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Abstract
Forest production and water use efficiency are tightly linked to forest evapotranspiration. Most evapotranspiration studies focus on bulk trends over entire rotations and downplay the dynamics of soil evaporation in early stand development prior to canopy closure. We estimated the relative importance of leaf litter and canopy leaf area (i.e., shading) on forest soil evaporation, formulated correction coefficients based on an existing widely used model to predict soil evaporation given variable leaf litter and canopy shade levels, and used modelled leaf-area-index (LAI) explain responses of soil evaporation to variable forest control conditions. Results suggest that litter limited soil evaporation more than canopy shade and soil evaporation is explained well by trends in modelled LAI. These results may be used to inform better litter and canopy related forest management decisions in the future.