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Main felling
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3.5. Main felling
Main felling and forest restoration felling in the protection forest plantations, conducted as clear (final) felling, have the greatest, most radical and wide-spread impact on forest ecosystems, on the diversity of their biological components and on forest landscapes.
The scales of main felling in the basin forests are fairly large, though they decreased in the 1990s. On the whole, 7.7 million cubic meters of timber are annually cut in the basin forests in the course of main felling. In 1991-1995, the scope of main felling was 9.2 million cubic meters. The rate of calculated wood-cutting area development varies depending on the region and species groups. The calculated wood-cutting area is used by 87%-98% in the forest-poor districts of Ukraine. The highest development rate is characteristic of coniferous and, to a lesser degree, hard-leaved plantations. At the same time, 25%-60% of mature forest stands of soft-leaved species (birch, aspen, alder, etc) remain unused.
In Polessye administrative-territorial complex of Russia, the use of calculated wood-cutting area over the last 5 years has been under 40%, and in Smolensk oblast the development of mature small-leaved forest stand has been as low as 15%-20%.
The preservation of increasingly larger areas of old-age forest stands is favorable for the flora and fauna diversity in the basin.
The most environmentally smooth types of felling (selective and gradual) that are close to the natural patterns of forest dynamics are not widely used in the basin forests. Noteworthy are the good practice and activity of some forestry enterprises in Belarus that use selective main felling. While in 1991-1995, selective and gradual felling was used annually on the area of 562 hectares to cut, on the average, 45.6 thousand cubic meters of timber, in 1996-2000 these types of felling were carried out on the area of 1,483 hectares cutting 104.3 thousand cubic meters of wood, which makes up 12.3% of the area and 4.2% of the scope of main felling in the Belorussian part of the basin.
Main felling leads to a number of negative consequences for the biological and landscape diversity in the basin, including:
- destruction of forest plant community in general, its disappearance from the forest landscape mosaic;
- fragmentation of forest areas;
- death, displacement and suppression of coenotic populations of the majority of forest species that existed prior to the felling, especially of those characteristic of the advanced (mature) stages of forest dynamics, as the result of changing their habitats;
- higher probability of further degradation of habitats and growing conditions of forest species resulting from water and wind erosion and swamping in respective areas;
- break in the dynamics of native and climax community formation;
- cessation of the natural species rotation and its replacement with the artificial one accompanied with forest restoration by forest species production;
- shrinking areas of old-age forests;
- higher probability of developing degressive successions when native and pioneer forest species are supplanted with weed and invasive ones;
- destruction of habitats of numerous trees-related species groups: birds, animals, insects, mushrooms, epiphytic lichens, mosses, etc;
- withdrawal from substance and energy circulation in the forests ecosystem of the most essential circulation components: phytomass of trees or, at least, their trunks;
- complete or partial destruction of the field layer with all its components by heavy logging equipment;
- burning out (on individual spots or the entire wood-cutting area) of the natural forest flora accompanied with the death of plant and animal organisms and their populations;
- contamination of the environment with oil products or their combustion products;
- mechanical damage caused to the remaining trees and undergrowth in the wood-cutting areas by logging equipment;
- weakening of surrounding forest stands, sometimes conducive to the outbursts of forest pests populations and the development of forest diseases;
- higher probability of windfall in the areas adjacent to the wood-cutting ones;
- use of technologies incompatible with the fauna and flora conservation.
Main felling and final sanitary felling have similar impact on biota and landscapes, which can sometimes be positive and manifest itself in the following:
- clearing of living space for developing the populations of species requiring open space for their development;
- new potential for the realization of living strategies for the species and forms suppressed by the forest canopy;
- emerging mosaic of new biotopes enhancing biological diversity owing to the species requiring burnt-out or mineralized soils;
- “renewal” and increased diversity of the succession dynamics of forest communities: emerging in the landscape structure of the elements representing early stages of the forest succession dynamics (clearings, natural and planted undergrowth);
- increased biotope diversity.
