Multi-aged micro-neighborhood patches challenge the forest cycle model in primeval European beech

• Main Authors: Zenner EK, Peck JE, Trotsiuk V
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Italian Society of Silviculture and Forest Ecology (SISEF) 2020-06-01
• Series: iForest - Biogeosciences and Forestry
• Subjects: age reconstruction; carpathians; dendrochronology; development stage; forest cycle; stand development; structure; triangulated irregular network (tin)
• Online Access: https://iforest.sisef.org/contents/?id=ifor3309-013
• ISSN: 1971-7458; 1971-7458

As currently framed, the forest cycle model that underlies close-to-nature management in temperate beech forests throughout the globe specifies an orderly sequence of temporal development within even-aged patches comprising the forest mosaic. Although this model has been widely applied to European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) forests, the underlying assumptions of disturbance-induced even-agedness (i.e., within-patch age homogeneity) and competition-induced size differentiation (i.e., within-patch size heterogeneity) have not been tested in natural beech forests due to prohibitions on tree coring in primeval forest reserves. In a rare and unprecedented test dataset of spatially explicit tree ages in an old-growth European beech forest, we employed triangulated irregular networks of Delaunay triangles to objectively identify natural tree neighborhoods to determine if neighboring (i.e., within-patch) trees were even- or, at most, two-aged. Age differences among neighboring trees (summarized in 25-yr age classes) were rarely <25 yrs and mostly >50 yrs, while the few "even-aged" patches were very small (100 m2) and relatively young (<150 yrs). In this first assessment of the assumptions underlying the forest cycle model in European beech, we observed neither the even-aged cohorts expected for disturbance-induced patches in different phases of development, nor the size differentiation among similarly aged trees that should arise from the neighborhood dynamics of competition, self-thinning, and growth. The lack of patches indicating demographic turnover is fundamentally inconsistent with the forest cycle model as it is currently framed. We call for further exploration of spatially-explicit tree age datasets to determine the generality of these observations.