Trends of Post-fire Forest Recovery in the South Sikhote-Alin Mountains, Russian Far East

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

To understand natural regeneration and stand development after fire in mixed broadleaved-coniferous forests of Sikhote-Alin Mountains, ten sample plots of $50m{\times}50m$ size were established in 1975 and 1983 at the stands burned by wildfires in 1973 and 1982, respectively. And, the number of naturally regenerated seedlings were monitored in two $50m{\times}4m$ subplots in each plot. The most fire-sensitive conifer species is Abies nephrolepis, while Betula costata is the most fire-sensitive broadleaved tree species. The most fire-resistant species were Q. mongolica, T. taquetii and A. mono. The results of 20 and 30 years after the fire showed that pioneer tree species, e.g. Populus, Salix, and Betula, were regenerated immediately at the early stage of stand development and grew where there is a mono canopy layer with high density. On the other hand, the densities of successors, e.g. Pinus koraiensis, Picea jezoensis, Abies nephrolepis, Acer mono and Tilia taquetii, which were present in the study plots before the fire, increased gradually. Naturally regenerated tree species after forest fire by the growth rate were divided into three groups according to their annual height growth. The seral tree species (Betula costata, Betula platyphylla, Padus maackii, Populus tremula and Sarix caprea) belong to the first group and have the highest growth rate (from 40 to 96 cm per year). The late successional broad-leaved trees (Tilia taquetii, Acer mono and Quercus mongolica) belong to the second group and have intermediate annual height growth (from 3.7 to 13.5 cm per year). The late successional coniferous species (Picea jezoensis, Pinus koraiensis and Abies nephrolepis) form the third group and have the least annual height growth (from 1.4 to 3.5 cm per year).