Forest management in a secondary Atlantic Rainforest: assessing the harvest damage

Abstract

Minimizing the impacts to the residual stand is one of the goals of sustainable forest management. To achieve this goal it’s essential to know the dynamics of these impacts, its frequency, cause and severity. Various studies in this topic were carried out in primary tropical forest, but little is known in secondary forests, which have smaller and denser tree community. We evaluate the bole and crown damage and the incidence of leaning trees in the residual stand right after the timber harvesting in a secondary Atlantic Rainforest in southern Brazil. On average, 26% of the residual trees suffered some kind of damage, with 12.1% suffering moderate or severe damage. Bole damage was the most frequent, followed by the crown damage and leaning tree. The frequency of damages showed no statistic relation with the harvest intensity in all cases but crown damage, whilst the number of damaged trees per harvested tree showed strong negative relation with the harvest intensity. The skidding was the major cause of damage and had no relation with harvest intensity. Although it affected less than 1/3 of the residual stand, it is important to monitor the injured trees to clarify the long term consequences of the damages.