Stand development patterns of forest cover types in the natural forests of northern Baekdudaegan in South Korea

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to classify current forest cover types, and to investigate stand development patterns for natural forests in six areas in northern Baekdudaegan, South Korea. Twenty-eight independent forest communities were aggregated into eight forest cover types by species composition in the overstory of each forest community. The forest cover types were of mixed mesophytic, “others” deciduous, Quercus mongolica dominant, Q. mongolica pure, Pinus densiflora–Q. mongolica, P. densiflora, Betula ermanii, and Q. mongolica–P. koraiensis. The ecological information was organized by importance value and species diversity for each forest type. Based on the correlation between species diversity index and the abundance of Q. mongolica plus P. densiflora for corresponding forest cover types, we compared the developmental process and approximate successional pathway between each cover type. The P. densiflora forest cover type changes into the P. densiflora–Q. mongolica cover type, followed by the Q. mongolica dominant cover type through continuous invasion of the oak trees. Furthermore, the Q. mongolica pure cover type would spread toward the Q. mongolica dominant cover type with a mixture of various deciduous tree species. The Q. mongolica dominant cover type progresses through the other deciduous cover types to the mixed mesophytic cover type with diversified composition and structure. On the mid to lower slopes, with loamy soils and good moisture conditions, various deciduous forest types should progress, by ecological succession, toward the mixed mesophytic cover type without any further disturbance.