Living stands and dead wood in the Białowieża forest: suggestions for restoration management
Introduction
Old trees and coarse woody debris (CWD) are among the features being most frequently used as the basic descriptors of the old-growth forests (Falinski, 1986, Keddy and Drummond, 1996, Carey, 1998). They reflect the continuity of natural processes and the degree of human interference. Numerous other old-growth characteristics, such as complex avian and mammal communities, relic invertebrates and fungi, epiphitic flora, etc. are strictly correlated with the above-mentioned characteristics (e.g. Faliński, 1986; Tomiałojć, 1991; Carey et al., 1999; Jdrzejewska and Jdrzejewski, 1998).
An increasing interest in dead wood is filling the considerable gap in our knowledge concerning the role of dead wood in living ecosystems. This gap was caused by the false reductionistic intuition for separating the living components of an ecosystem from abiotic factors. Being somewhere between stand and soil, dead wood was often ignored in research studies. Contrary to scientific interest, the aesthetic value of dead wood, symbolising an unspoiled nature, has always been of a great appeal for artists. In a separate development, practitioners, forest land owners, and forestry managers considered dead wood as a potential threat to the forestry sustainability. Depending on the local susceptibility of managed forests to pests or wildfire, management systems have been developed that implicitly include radical reduction in amounts of woody debris.
The recent increase of interest in dead wood coincides with the world-wide discussion on the role of forests as carbon sink and rich reservoirs of biodiversity. The role of forests in sequestrating and immobilising carbon was emphasized in numerous researches (e.g. Harmon et al., 1985, Andrasko, 1990, Cairns and Meganck, 1994). Postel and Heise (1988), Flavin (1989), and Harmon et al. (1990), all cited after Cairns and Meganck (1994), as well as Brown et al. (1997) stress that old-growth forests offer a bigger carbon sequestration capacity than that offered by managed forests.
Even though, the nutrient content in dead wood is lower than that in leaf litter, CWD may be a very important nutrient sink because it is less labile than other litter (Polit and Brown, 1996). It also provides stability to the ecosystem sequestering nutrients from the products of microbial immobilisation (Chueng and Brown, 1995).
Global loss of biodiversity coincides with disappearing old-growth forests, the majority of threatened species are those related to the late seral stages of forest development (e.g. Kirby and Drake, 1993, Buchholz and Ossowska, 1995, Pielou, 1995, Irmler et al., 1996, Buchholz and Ossowska, 1998).
Although, the role of logs as a plant habitat was studied in the Białowieża 64 years ago (Hackiewicz-Dubowska, 1936), a recent systematic and multidisciplinary investigation, carried out in a 140 ha portion of that forest, has pointed to a high richness of primeval communities associated with dead wood (Bujakiewicz et al., 1995, Cieslinski et al., 1995, Klama, 1995, Zarnowiec, 1995, Chlebicki et al., 1996, Cieslinski et al., 1996, Falinski and Mulenko, 1997).
The importance of CWD as the nurse-logs for tree regeneration, particularly in bog forest communities and in boreal spruce forests is well documented (e.g. Paczoski, 1930, Falinski, 1986, Hofgaard, 1993). Less attention has been paid to situation when concentration of logs form natural exclosures and allow patches of ungrazed vegetation to develop (Franklin and Dyrness, 1973, Sharpe, 1956, after Harmon et al., 1985). Surprisingly, it may be an important factor contributing to the structure and dynamics of stands.
Since quality and quantity of dead wood depend on the character of the stand, the CWD should be related to stand composition, structure, and dynamics. The dead wood budget is governed by two major processes: (1) decay of predisturbance and disturbance-generated debris, and (2) the residual accumulation of debris from the developing stand (Harmon et al., 1985). A thorough analysis of CWD recruitment in terms of species, position of logs, and dimension was reported from the Białowieża primeval forest (BPF) by Faliński (1978). He found that the trees most often blown down in the rich deciduous forest are spruces of medium size classes; spatial and temporal patterns of blowdown are determined by autumn and spring gales. The analysis of stand composition and the composition of CWD led him to make the statement that oak-lime–hornbeam forests go through the phases of dominance with different tree species such as a Tilia, Carpinus, and Picea phase (Faliński, 1978). Analysis of CWD has also been used to reconstruct the history of mixed oak stands in Ohio forests, with documentation of species-specific mortality waves (Goebel and Hix, 1997). Although, it has been suggested that developmental pathways of stands are predictable, they may be randomly changed by the disturbance events (Goebel and Hix, 1997). Gradual stem exclusion accompanying maturing of stands and random disturbances (windfalls and fire) were indicated as two main factors generating CWD in North American boreal forests (Lee et al., 1997, Sturtevant et al., 1997). Exogenous disturbances are also responsible for strong variability in the amount and quality of CWD in the old-growth boreal forests in southern Finland (Siitonen et al., 2000). Although, various practical measures aimed at retaining or mimicking the old-growth features in the managed forest are recommended (e.g. Persson and Manus, 1990, Carey and Curtis, 1996, Sturtevant et al., 1997), a full restoration of the old-growth structural and functional complexity in the managed forests is not achievable within a short period of time (Brown et al., 1997, Siitonen et al., 2000). Carey (1998) even states that old growth is a non-renewable, but perishable, resource with a highly variable and uncertain “shelf life”. Forest management practices in southern Finland, such as commercial cutting and thinning may result in 10-fold lower amount of CWD in the mature managed stand, compared to that in the old-growth and may lead to a qualitative impoverishment of this ecosystem component (Siitonen et al., 2000).
Despite the existing data concerning the amount of dead wood in the BPF (Falinski, 1978, Kirby et al., 1991, Bobiec, 1998), little is known about its spatial distribution and diameter structure in various communities and developmental phases of the forest.
The aim of the present study was to compare CWD and stand characteristics in two community types: mesic deciduous forest (Tilio–Carpinetum (TC)) and riparian forest (Circaeo–Alnetum (CA)). The qualitative and quantitative spatial variability of stand and dead wood data are an important source of information about historical and present dynamic trends in communities. Direct comparison of managed forest to protected area provides information about the impact of the forestry practices on TC stand and CWD characteristics. The trends I observed in the restricted area and the present condition of the managed part of the BPF should provide sound premises for the adaptive management aimed at the restoration of the ecological capacity of ecosystems.
Section snippets
Study site
The BPF (52°43′N, 23°50′E) is the best preserved lowland forest in the European temperate zone. Abiotic conditions in the forest are: (1) a continental climate (mean annual precipitation 641 mm, ranging from 426 to 940 mm, 85% in rain; mean annual temperature 6.8°C, ranging from 5.1 to 8.8°C, with the mean temperature in July ranging from 15.2 to 21.6°C, and in January from −13.4 to 1.8°C; Olszewski, 1986); (2) a post-glacial formation (vast plains with small altitude differences, with altitude
Results
As collected in Table 1 the present data refer to the following categories:
A: Situation of an “average” community resulting from unselective, random sampling across the community (along the polygons); three sub-categories have been addressed; TC in BNP, TC in CF, and CA in BNP.
B: Specific characteristic of the distinguished developmental phases in TC community in BNP.
Discussion
Polygon data represent average conditions of communities which, in TC, are derivatives of the features characterising developmental phases. The aggradation phase labelled here as YYP and YPP, was intermediate between young and pole phases (Yng and Po), while R had fewer saplings than the regeneration phase (Rg, Bobiec et al., 2000). There was no major discrepancy between the P+ and O characteristics and those of the late pole (Po+) and optimal (Opt) phases, respectively. The phase labelled as
Conclusions
- 1.
Two major attributes of natural hardwood forests in Białowieża have been pointed out: large (legacy) living trees and CWD.
- 2.
Uneven distribution of the large trees (mostly oaks and limes) strongly contributes to the differences in the tree volume capacity among the stands. This is due to largely unknown historical factors and conditions which have ruled the establishment of stands in the past.
- 3.
Though unevenly distributed, CWD is an ecosystem element having relatively even qualitative and
Acknowledgements
The study was a part of the research project 6P04F054/12 financed by the National Committee of Scientific Research (KBN). Godewijn van den Bouwhuijsen and Christel Kruse, students from the Larenstein International College in Velp (Holland) made the measurements in developmental phases. Harm Smeenge, Wouter Strijk, Kim Meijer, Bart van der Linden, Pieter Zorgdrager from Helicon MBCS, Velp, and Aljoscha Requardt from the Forest Faculty in Tharandt (Germany) provided excellent assistance in
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