Spatial pattern and amount of deadwoods in managed and unmanaged natural forests in Kheiroudkenar region, Noshahr

The ecological importance of deadwoods has led to an ever-increasing collection of related information to be taken into account in management plans. Considering the key role of deadwoods in forest ecosystem, the present study investigated some of the most important characteristics of deadwoods, including number, volume and spatial distribution pattern in a natural forest with beech dominance. For this purpose, two managed and unmanaged regions were selected from Gorazbon district of Kheyrudkenar forest in the vicinity of Noshahr as the study area and full calipering inventory of deadwoods was done. Moreover, species, diameter and height of standing deadwoods and in the case of fallen deadwoods, characteristics such as species, median diameter and their length were recorded and measured. In order to study the spatial pattern of the deadwood, the position of each deadwood was obtained by azimuth distance method using a laser distance finder and subsequently analyzed by univariate O-rings statistic functions. The results showed that the frequency of deadwoods were in the managed area more than of the unmanaged area, whereas the volume of deadwoods in unmanaged area was more. The highest number and volume of deadwoods were in low-diameter class of the managed area and in large and very large class of the unmanaged area respectively. The O-ring statistic showed that the spatial pattern of whole deadwoods in the managed and unmanaged area was completely random. Thus it can be stated that disturbances in studied area were in small scale. The amount of deadwood especially in managed area is not enough and its increasing is one of the requirements that with regarding to disturbance and structure pattern should be considered.