Tree density by development stage in the “El Carrizal” wathershed of Tapalpa, Jalisco

Abstract

The Tapalpa forest presents an abundance of pine trees in the juvenile stage ofregeneration and sapling, but this amount progressively decreases in thesuccessive stages, when the trees show larger dimensions and take up more spaceto grow. However, it was unknown how much the loss was and how much itreached the maximum size. The objective was to quantify the grove, the individualspace, the separation between trees and their decrease. The stages were classifiedaccording to the normal diameter and the sites were classified as excessive,recommendable, sufficient and poor density. Frequency distribution, loss, spacing,and distance between trees were calculated using the Hart-Becking formula.During the development cycle, the loss was close to 90 % with a rate of 0.2 to 3%, presenting a cumulative of 60 % in the monte bravo and vardazcal stages. Therecommended class began with 1 300 to 2 700 trees ha⁻¹ in the juvenile phase,with their respective spacing of 2.07 to 2.98 m, while the mature stage culminatedwith 150 trees ha⁻¹ separated at 8.77 m. The distance between trees is consideredan auxiliary tool in thinning operations.