Arboriculture for quality timber production with hardwood: results after 20 years from planting

Abstract

In the last decades, production forestry plantations has been developed using typical forest tree species, or species of agricultural interest, such as walnut and cherry. The use of these species in a context different than the traditional one put a number of problems not easy to solve. The present study has considered some timber-quality plantations of hardwoods species (Acer pseudoplatanus L., Prunus avium L., Fraxinus excelsior L., Juglans regia L.) established on the Serre Catanzaresi (VV), with the aim of assessing the achievements obtained both in quantitative (growth) and qualitative (shape of the stems, degree of branching) terms. The results of the analyses carried out revealed that the studied plantations are an interesting example of possibilities and limits of cultivation of commonly used hardwoods in relation to the practices adopted. The observed differences are mainly related to the different species used. Some of them (sycamore and wild cherry) guaranteed satisfactory results, others (ash and walnut) showed severe limitations, due to the poor quality of planting material, the incompatibility between the species needs and site characteristics, or because these species usually constitute mixed populations.

Keywords

• Arboriculture for quality timber production
• Sycamore
• Cherry
• Walnut
• Ash
• Calabria