Analisi strutturale e gestione delle faggete dell’Appennino meridionale
Author(s)
Gentile, Francesca
Date Issued
January 15, 2009
Type
Doctoral Thesis
Abstract
This doctorate thesis had as own objective to carry on the analysis of some pure and
mixed beech stands in Mediterranean environment, with the aim to individuate and
describe several structural typologies, also through the use of synthetic indices, and to
develop for them specific sustainable management forms, able to keep the biological and
structural diversity and the complexity of the forest ecosystem, maintaining at the same
time the historical, cultural, landscape and economic values, that man attributed to the
wood.
Structure, biodiversity and complexity of the system are closely connected concepts.
Structure itself is considered a basic element of the diversity at stand level and, therefore,
its study provides important information about the health and the complexity/
simplification level of the wood, permits to check the stand answer to the past
interventions and allows to formulate indications for the management.
From this viewpoint, four zones, representative of the beech woods along the southern
Apennine, have been individuated:
- Monte Scorda wood (Aspromonte – Oppido Mamertina);
- Ferdinandea wood (Serre Catanzaresi – Stilo);
- Spirito Santo wood (Sila Grande – Spezzano Piccolo);
- Colle Vespa wood (Sila Piccola – Petronà).
Several transects have been bounded. Inside them, traditional sylvicultural and dendroauxometric
reliefs, observations on structure and regeneration have been carried out. Then,
the collected data have been elaborated in order to characterize the stands and to
individuate the structural typologies. The analysis has been conducted with qualitative
examinations and descriptions, but also through the synthetic structural indices application,
able to quantitatively describe the spatial stand structure. The application of these indices,
allowed to easily outline and represent the stands and, above all, to make comparisons
among the different examined situations.
The applied indices are:
- NBSI group (Neighbourhood Based Structural Indices), in particular UAI index
(Uniform Angle Index), SM index (Species Mingling), DBHD index (diametric
dominance) and DIST index (distance). They are opportune in the analysis of the
horizontal structure;
- MORISITA dispersion index, that provides information about horizontal structure;
- LATHAM index, useful in the vertical structure analysis.
Four structural types have been individuated:
- Monoplane beech wood;
- Multi-layered beech wood;
- Multi-layered mixed beech-fir wood;
- Beech coppice over the usual rotation.
In the first part of the thesis, the close link among biodiversity, complexity, stability and
forest management, have been pointed out, considering the importance of the structure as a
monitoring element, as a system diversity component, as answer and assumption to the
sylvicultural interventions.
The second part of the thesis describes botanical, ecological and sylvicultural aspects of
the beech and the main structural typologies for this species.
In the third part, the used methodologies to individuate the areas, to carry on the reliefs
and to apply the structural indices, have been exposed, and the found types have been
explained. At last, the obtained results have been discussed, in order to suggest possible
and specific proposals of sustainable forest management.
Additional information
Dottorato di ricerca in Ecologia forestale
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