Boschi pascolati, pascoli arborati: aspetti nazionali e internazionali
Author(s)
Emanueli, Francesca
Date Issued
May 30, 2014
Type
Doctoral Thesis
Abstract
Woodpastures are forestry-pastoral systems of high cultural and biological value, whose importance is internationally known. Nowadays the interest in woodpastures is various, for their landscape, environmental and economic role. Currently, only few regions in north-eastern Italy are promoting the mainteinance of these types of land uses, through incentives and premiums paid with EU founds. In the rest of Italy there is a certain opposition to the practice of grazing in the woods, so that it is usually restricted. This thesis aims to provide an overview of the traditional ways to manage woodpastures in Italy and in Europe, highlighting their environmental sustainability. The traditional management of woodpastures implies a series of specific arrangements (i.e. pruning, pollarding, trimming) that can ensure the renewal of the trees and of the grass, the fodder production for the livestock and high levels of habitat and species biodiversity. The management techniques required for recovering and managing these forests can be founded in the historical forest bibliography. Beginning from the XVIII century, the Italian and European silviculture, has emphasised mainly the timber production instead of the multifunctionality, that however, has always been recognised to the forest by the local people. Only in Spain was established a form of treatment based on the parameters of modern forestry. The trees in the mountain pastures also protect the grass. The species that compose these woods are mainly shade-tolerant species, with a very covering crown (i.e. the Spruce Fir). For these reasons the trees are kept on pastures in small woods (2500-3000 m2) and apart from each other, so that the surface of the pasture can get direct sunlight for a few hours a day. The treatment of these trees requires cuts on small surfaces, to maintain the woods all-aged. The surface of the pasture is divided into sections according to the forage production and to the livestock rate that has to be introduced. Each wood can be permanently enclosed with hedgerows or dry stone walls. Otherwise temporary fences can be used until the natural regeneration is not damaged by the bite of cattle. The high forest with scattered trees used for grazing, is made up of heliophilous species, like oaks, with light crown, so that the grass is not overshadows. If these trees are kept apart from each other they can provide abundant fruit production. The distance between the trees is determined by degree of the ground cover of the crowns. Silvicultural management results in a selection cutting that promote continuous regeneration under coverage. Monitoring the coverage degree is important to balance the competitive relation between pasture and trees, and, at the same time, ensure the protective and production role of woodpasture. The tendings of the stands consists of pruning, selective trimming of undergrowth to encourage the seedlings and improvement of the pasture. The silvicultural and ecological knowledge of the past are so necessary to restore forestry systems, such as woodpastures, to which the classical silvicultural model cannot be applied. This means to find a compromise between the productive goals, the conservation of biodiversity, and the preservation of the traditional value of these traditional management systems, which nowadays typify the historical rural landscape and the beauty of many European territories. The coppice with pollards was a form of management frequently applied in Italian and English woodpastures. The wood of Sant’Antonio in Pescocostanzo (Aquila), one of the most important wooded pastures, which in Abruzzo go under the name of Difesa (defense), is known for the presence of individuals monumental beech, maple, pear, characterized largely by forms due to the practice of pollarding, the type of pruning, aimed at the production of branches, the collection of firewood and the containment of the canopy to allow the grass production below. The disappearance of the traditional use of the wooded pasture, and the suspension of the management of pollarding, are causing the slow but inexorable deterioration of the tree structure: plants ever higher and wider canopy, closure of the clearings, and progressive reduction in some disappearance of the grassy turf areas. Other pitfalls are related to the large number of visitors for the purpose of recreation in the spring-summer period. The forest be included in a national park and classified largely as a reserve, on the one hand hinders the action necessary to recover the functionality and with it the traditional landscape of wooded pasture , and for another it is not enough to protect it from damage due to excessive attendance. It is in this paper presented an analysis of the evolution of the forest since the first steps were taken to safeguard (1953). Analysis , which is preliminary to the definition of guidelines for a management plan aimed at upgrading the wooded pasture , and that is based on the chronological comparison with aerial photographs of the expansion of the forest (1954-2010) and the closure of the open areas, and on ground surveys with which it is registered dimensional evolution of individual trees since 1987.
Additional information
Dottorato di ricerca in Scienze e tecnologie per la gestione forestale e ambientale
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