After a short description of the structures and functions of forest ecosystems and their interactions with adjacent systems, the various anthropogenic strains, which threaten the forests and/or their social and economic significance for society, are reviewed. Examples of strains on central European forest ecosystems in former times were: Rooting out; rough exploitation; fires; shifting cultivation; cattle and sheep grazing; litter gathering. Recent factors and tendencies, which should be examined with regard to the possible damage, the may cause to forest ecosystems, are: The continuing claim of forest areas for settlements, industrial plants and installations for the infrastructure; the use of pesticides; the accelerated mechanization of all forest operations; the overpopulation of big herbivores; the immission of gaseous or dusty materials and salts; the accumulation of tourists in some recreation areas; the spreading of urban or industrial wastes and large-scale fertilization. In discussing the influence of clearcutting on the nutrient budgets of landscapes and the possible effects of sewage sludge within forest ecosystems, it is demonstrated, that we have insufficient knowledge of the functioning of forest ecosystems under natural conditions as well as under the influence of human intervention. This situation should be considered as a challenge to an extraordinary scientific effort, aiming to develop the basis for the conservation of forest landscapes as natural, diverse, stable and well operating parts of the biosphere, by the means of long-term, well organized and interdisciplinary research.
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