Abstract

The restorers of degraded areas require high quality plants, with ideal morphological attributes to be able to establish successfully on the plantation sites, even if the site conditions are adverse. In order to know the plant quality of six pine species, that will be used for reforestation and restoration of forest lands in the state of México, we evaluated five morphological attributes based on the Mexican Norm NMX-AA-170-SCFI-2016 and Rodríguez-Ortiz et al. (2020). At the Heroes Bicentennial Forest Nursery of Tecámac, we measured seedling’s basal diameter (at the root neck (DC)), height, from the base to the apical bud (Alt), slenderness index (IE = Alt/DC), aerial dry biomass and dry root biomass ratio (BSA/BSR) and Dickson's quality index (ICD). For DC, the results showed that all species but Pinus ayacahuite, had high quality. In Alt, P. greggii and P. leiophylla had the best quality; while in IE, all the species but P. greggii, showed high quality. For the BSA/BSR ratio, P. cembroides, P. ayacahuite and P. hartwegii were the best, and for ICD, P. hartwegii had the highest quality value. Considering all the morphological indicators together, we determined that P. cembroides and P. greggii had the best plant quality. This information is key to analyze the seedling’s survival in the field and make timely decisions in land restoration management.

Highlights

  • Reforestation programs in Mexico are a strategy for increasing forest areas and reducing forest land degradation

  • In Alt, P. greggii and P. leiophylla had higher values than that of Mexican Norm, whereas P. ayacahuite and P. pseudostrobus showed lower height than those established in the Norm (Table 1)

  • For IE, all the species but P. greggii, had values

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Summary

Introduction

Reforestation programs in Mexico are a strategy for increasing forest areas and reducing forest land degradation. In 2011, the program reforested 350,000 ha and ranked the country among the four with a higher amount of trees planted. Low seedling survival rate is an important problem, which is associated to poor seedling quality. Despite some works about plant quality parameters in Mexico, the knowledge is still limited due to the variability in conditions, species and production processes in nurseries. The present work aimed to evaluate the plant quality of six pine species produced in a nursery in polyethylene bags

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