Rainfall, fog and throughfall dynamics in a sub-tropical ridge-top cloud forest, National Park of Garajonay (La Gomera, Canary Islands, Spain)

Mixed tree-heath/beech forest is a type of subtropical montane cloud forest found on wind- and fog-exposed ridges in the Canary Islands. With a dry season of 5 months and an annual precipitation of 600-700 mm, the extra water inputs through fog interception assume particular importance in this environment. Measurements were made of rainfall, fog occurrence, wind speed and direction as well as of throughfall (TF) in a ridge top cloud forest located near the centre of the National Park of Garajonay on the island of La Gomera. Measured amounts of incident rainfall were corrected for wind-induced losses around the gauge and for topographic effects. Amounts of fog water as collected by a 0·25-