Extent and distribution of beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) regeneration by adult trees individually dispersed over a spruce monoculture

Abstract

Recently individually dispersed adult beech trees have regenerated in spruce monocultures and this fact could be used to manage the transformation of stands into a mixed forest. Three such cases in the fir-beech and spruce-beech forest zones were analyzed. Beech regeneration is dispersed to distances of several hundred meters regardless of the configuration of the terrain. Using a model we describe this process by a dispersion curve that can be broken up into three sections: (1) directly under the crown as the result of barochory; (2) from 15 to 30 m from the trunk, where the barochoric and zoochoric dispersal of beech nuts intersects; (3) from the "breakpoint" to farther away as a result of zoochory. Regeneration is utilizable as an optimal or at least acceptable method for creating the next economically valuable stands only in sections 1 and 2. In section 3 individual trees may be the central points for the transformation of the second successive forest generation. With spontaneous development without protection from game the density is in the range of hundreds of individuals; in protected groups density can be in the range of tens of thousands of individuals per hectare.

Keywords

• beech
• dispersed trees
• forest dynamics
• regeneration
• transformation of spruce monocultures