presentation of Ingrowth models and determination of biotic and abiotic factors affecting regeneration in the Hyrcanian forests

Document Type : Research Paper

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Abstract

Background and objectives: Hyrcanian is a productive region near the southern coast of Caspian Sea. Her forests are mostly uneven-aged beach-dominated hardwood mixtures. There is increasing willingness to treat these forests without clear-felling, following the ideas of continuous cover management. This paper examines the possible ecological controls on ingrowth in a high-elevation forest in northern Iran. Natural regeneration is one of the most important affecting factors in survival and stability of natural forests. Understanding the factors that affecting the forest species regeneration can be helpful to understand the ecosystem succession stages. Recently, due to complexity of factors that affecting natural regeneration, using the growing models in order to determine affecting factors is very common.
Materials and methods: The Kheyrud forest covers 80 km2 near the port city of Nowshahr. The elevation of the Kheyrud forest varies from 10 m to 2200 m above sea level Ingrowth model was used to estimate the diameter increment in oriental beech at fixed sample plots level over a period of 9 years (2003-2012) In this study the impact of biotic and abiotic variables like competition, energy of sunlight in the growing season, topographic wetness index, highest point to nearest of drainage area, wind speed from ground-complex process models and other variables which are considered to be achieved for the first time on natural regeneration were investigated using fixed plots in Hyrcanian forests.
Results: Results showed that the mean number of regeneration in the unit area (hectares) are very low and equal to approximately 15 trees per hectare (up to a diameter of 7 cm) in a period of 9 years. The simplest way to predict and simulate ingrowth is to use the mean values for all stands. However, this is not biologically justified since ingrowth should eventually start decreasing with increasing stand basal area. The beech trees are of the most number of regeneration per hectare which represents the suitability of environmental and biological conditions for these valuable trees in the Hyrcanian forests. Basel area per hectare was the main affecting factor on regeneration in study area which defines about 40 percent of regeneration.
Conclusion: Humidity and temperature and the amount of solar radiation were the most important variables in the number of regeneration in Hyrcanian Forests. Consequently methods that used in this study are new and also can be used in other forested area in Iran. Finally, this research is trying to explain changes of ingrowth and abiotic and biotic variables in the fixed sample plots.

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References

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Journal of Wood and Forest Science and Technology
Volume 24, Issue 2
September 2017
Pages 1-16

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