regeneration of a coastal pine (pinus thunbergii parl.) forest 11 years after thinning, niigata, japan沿海松树的再生(松果体thunbergii parl)。.pdfVIP

Regeneration of a Coastal Pine (Pinus thunbergii Parl.) Forest 11 Years after Thinning, Niigata, Japan 1,2 3 1,2 1,2 1,2 1,2 Jiaojun Zhu *, Yutaka Gonda , Lizhong Yu , Fengqin Li , Qiaoling Yan , Yirong Sun 1 State Key Laboratory of Forest and Soil Ecology, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang, China, 2 Qingyuan Experimental Station of Forest Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang, China, 3 Faculty of Agriculture, Niigata University, Niigata, Japan Abstract To examine the effects of thinning intensity on wind vulnerability and regeneration in a coastal pine (Pinus thunbergii) forest, thinning with intensities of 20%, 30% and 50% was conducted in December 1997; there was an unthinned treatment as the control (total 8 stands). We re-measured the permanent sites to assess the regeneration characteristics 11 years after thinning. In the 50% thinned stand, seedlings aged from 2 to 10 years exhibited the highest pine seedling density and growth. The age composition ranged from 1–3 years with densities of 9.9 and 5.1 seedlings m22 in 30% and 20% thinned stands; only 1-year-old seedlings with a density of 6.1 seedlings m22 in the unthinned stand. Similar trends were found for the regeneration of broadleaved species such as Robinia pseudoacacia and Prunus serrulata. We speculate that the canopy openness and moss coverage contributed to the regeneration success in the 50% thinned stand, while the higher litter depth and lack of soil moisture induced the regeneration failure in the unthinned stand. The stands thinned at 20% or 30% were less favourable for pine regeneration than the stands thinned at 50%. Therefore, thinning with less