Simplified methods to inventory the current annual increment of forest standing volume

doi:10.3832/ifor0635-005

Simplified methods to inventory the current annual increment of forest standing volume

PA Marziliano⁽¹⁾ , G Menguzzato⁽¹⁾, A Scuderi⁽¹⁾, P Corona⁽²⁾

iForest - Biogeosciences and Forestry, Volume 5, Issue 6, Pages 276-282 (2012)
doi: https://doi.org/10.3832/ifor0635-005
Published: Dec 17, 2012 - Copyright © 2012 SISEF

Research Articles

PDF Version

Full Text

Citation

The assessment of the current annual increment of forest standing volume (CAI) is a fundamental tool to support forest management and planning. A suitable approach to such an end is to rely on growth and yield models. However, this kind of models are often not available for many countries and/or locations and/or species. Furthermore, they may become obsolete due to potential changes in the environmental and silvicultural conditions. Such shortcomings may be distinctively detrimental in the context of forest inventories. Several methods have been proposed to inventory CAI on one single occasion, i.e., when repeated measurements of standing volume are not available. A well-known family of methods, still largely exploited in Alpine and Eastern European countries, derives from the estimation of the percentage current annual increment of forest standing volume by the current annual increments of stem diameter and tree height (Δh). In this study an experimental comparison of Δh assessment by three different approaches is presented with reference to a properly designed case study: (i) Δh is measured on felled trees; (ii) Δh is estimated by dynamic height curve (i.e., diameter-height-age model); (iii) Δh is estimated by conventional height curve (i.e., diameter-height model). Under the examined experimental conditions (a pure forest of silver fir on highly fertile soils in southern Italy, aged around 60 years), both simplified approaches (ii) and (iii) have proven to underestimate height increments, with a larger underestimation by the approach based on the conventional height curve. However, the consequent error in the estimation of percentage current annual increment of forest standing volume has proved to be quite limited (4% for the approach based on the dynamic height curve and around 9% for the approach based on the conventional height curve). Hence, such simplified approaches may be rather safely considered for estimating percentage current annual increment of forest standing volume when neither Δh is directly detectable on standing trees nor sample trees can be felled, nor an appropriate model to predict Δh is available. The Δh estimation on the conventional height curve should turn out to be even more suitable in the case of uneven-aged stands, where the position of the height curve remains stationary over time.

Keywords

Forest growth, Percentage current annual increment, Current annual increment of tree height, Schneider’s coefficient, Forest management, Forest inventory

Authors’ address

(1)

Dipartimento di Gestione dei Sistemi Agrari e Forestali (GESAF), Mediterranean University di Reggio Calabria, Località Feo di Vito, I-89060 Reggio Calabria (Italy)

(2)

Dipartimento per l’Innovazione nei sistemi Biologici, Agroalimentari e Forestali (DIBAF), University of Tuscia, via San Camillo de Lellis snc, I-01100 Viterbo (Italy)

Corresponding author

PA Marziliano
pasquale.marziliano@unirc.it

Citation

Marziliano PA, Menguzzato G, Scuderi A, Corona P (2012). Simplified methods to inventory the current annual increment of forest standing volume. iForest 5: 276-282. - doi: 10.3832/ifor0635-005

Academic Editor

Marco Borghetti

Paper history

Received: Jul 18, 2012
Accepted: Oct 16, 2012

First online: Dec 17, 2012
Publication Date: Dec 28, 2012
Publication Time: 2.07 months

Open Access

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.

Breakdown by View Type

(Waiting for server response...)

Article Usage

Total Article Views: 30016
(from publication date up to now)

Breakdown by View Type
HTML Page Views: 23403
Abstract Page Views: 1355
PDF Downloads: 3939
Citation/Reference Downloads: 74
XML Downloads: 1245

Web Metrics
Days since publication: 4148
Overall contacts: 30016
Avg. contacts per week: 50.65

Article Citations

Article citations are based on data periodically collected from the Clarivate Web of Science web site
(last update: Nov 2020)

Total number of cites (since 2012): 16
Average cites per year: 1.78

(no Plumx Metrics available for this paper)

Publication Metrics

by Dimensions ^©

Articles citing this article

List of the papers citing this article based on CrossRef Cited-by.

(1)

Anfodillo T, Carraro V, Carrer M, Fior C, Rossi S (2006)
Convergent tapering of xylem conduits in different woody species. New Phytologist 169: 279-290.
CrossRef | Gscholar

(2)

Assmann E (1970)
The principles of forest yield study. Pergamon Press, Oxford, UK.
Gscholar

(3)

Corona P, Marziliano PA, Scotti R (2002)
Top-down growth modelling: a prototype for poplar plantations in Italy. Forest Ecology and Management 161: 65-73.
CrossRef | Gscholar

(4)

Corona P, Koehl M, Marchetti M (2003)
Introduction. In: “Advances in forest inventory for sustainable forest management and biodiversity monitoring” (Corona P, Koehl M, Marchetti M eds). Kluwer, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, pp. 71-85.
Gscholar

(5)

Corona P, Fattorini L, Franceschi S (2009)
Estimating the volume of forest growing stock using auxiliary information derived from relascope or ocular assessments. Forest Ecology and Management 257: 2108-2114.
CrossRef | Gscholar

(6)

Corona P, Scotti R (2011)
Systemic silviculture, adaptive management and forest monitoring perspectives. L’Italia Forestale e Montana 3: 219-224.
CrossRef | Gscholar

(7)

Davis LS, Johnson KN, Bettinger PS, Howard TE (2001)
Forest management: to sustain ecological, economic, and social values (4^th edn). McGraw-Hill, New York, USA.
Gscholar

(8)

Enquist BJ (2003)
Cope’s rule and the evolution of long-distance transport in vascular plants: allometric scaling, biomass partitioning and optimization. Plant Cell and Environment 26: 151-161.
CrossRef | Gscholar

(9)

Hara T, Kimura M, Kikuzawa K (1991)
Growth patterns of tree height and stem diameter in populations of Abies Veitchii, A. Mariesii and Betula Ermanii. The Journal of Ecology 79: 1085-1098.
CrossRef | Gscholar

(10)

von Gadow K, Hui G (1999)
Modelling forest development. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, The Netherlands.
Gscholar

(11)

Hasenauer H (1999)
Höhenzuwachsmodelle für die wichtigsten Baumarten Österreichs. Forstwissenschaftliches Centralblatt 118: 14-23.
CrossRef | Gscholar

(12)

Hellrigl B (1969)
Sul calcolo dell’incremento percentuale degli alberi in piedi. L’Italia Forestale e Montana, XXIV: 187-191.
Gscholar

(13)

Hellrigl B (1986)
Il rilevamento dendro-crono-auxometrico. In: “Nuove metodologie nella elaborazione dei piani di assestamento dei boschi”. Cap. 13. ISEA, Bologna, Italy, pp. 401-714.
Gscholar

(14)

IFNI (1988)
I° Inventario forestale nazionale (Tabacchi G, TosiV eds). MAF, Roma, Italy.
Gscholar

(15)

INFC (2009)
I caratteri quantitativi 2005 - parte 1, vers. 2. Inventario nazionale delle foreste e dei serbatoi forestali di carbonio (Gasparini P, De Natale F, Di Cosmo L, Gagliano C, Salvadori I, Tabacchi G, Tosi V, eds). MiPAAF - Ispettorato Generale Corpo Forestale dello Stato, CRA-MPF, Trento, Italy.
Gscholar

(16)

la Marca O (2004)
Elementi di dendrometria. II Edizione. Patron Editore, Bologna, Italy.
Gscholar

(17)

Marziliano PA, Barreca L, Menguzzato G, Nicolaci A, Pelle L, Scuderi A (2011)
Struttura e incrementi in boschi puri e misti di abete e faggio sull’Appennino calabrese. L’Italia Forestale e Montana 66 (1): 55-70.
CrossRef | Gscholar

(18)

Mencuccini M, Martinez-Vilalta J, Vanderklein D, Hamid HA, Korakaki E, Lee S, Michiels B (2005)
Size-mediated ageing reduces vigour in trees. Ecology Letters 8: 1183-1190.
CrossRef | Gscholar

(19)

Petit G, Anfodillo T, Mencuccini M (2008)
Tapering of xylem conduits and hydraulic limitations in sycamore (Acer pseudoplatanus) trees. New Phytologist 177: 653-664.
CrossRef | Gscholar

(20)

Principe M (1974)
Piano economico del patrimonio rustico di proprietà del Comune di Serra San Bruno (Catanzaro). Decennio di applicazione 1974-1983/84. C.F.S. Ispettorato Regionale delle Foreste, Reggio Calabria. Ufficio Assestamento Calabria, Catanzaro, Italy.
Gscholar

(21)

Pretzsch H (2009)
Forest dynamics, growth and yield. Springer Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg, Germany.
Gscholar

(22)

Prodan M (1965)
Holzmesslehre. J.D. Sauerländer’s Verlag, Frankfurt am Main, Germany.
Gscholar

(23)

Schweingruber FH (1996)
Tree rings and environment dendroecology. WSL FNP Haupt, Bern, Switzerlands, pp. 609.
Gscholar

(24)

Stage AR (1975)
Prediction of height increment for models of forest growth. Res. Pap. INT-164, USDA Forest Service, pp. 20.
Gscholar

(25)

Sumida A, Ito H, Isagi Y (1997)
Trade-off between height growth and stem diameter growth for an evergreen oak, Quercus glauca, in a mixed hardwood forest. Functional Ecology 11: 300-309.
CrossRef | Gscholar

(26)

Tabacchi G, Di Cosmo L, Gasparini P (2011)
Aboveground tree volume and phytomass prediction equations for forest species in Italy. European Journal of Forest Research 130: 911-934.
CrossRef | Gscholar

(27)

Vanclay JK (1994)
Modelling forest growth and yield. CAB International, Wallingford, USA.
Gscholar

(28)

Weiskittel AR, Hann DW, Kershaw JA, Vanclay JK (2011)
Forest growth and yield modeling. John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, Chicheste, UK.
Gscholar

(29)

Zar JH (1996)
Biostatistical analysis (3^rd edn). Prentice-Hall International, New York, USA.
Gscholar

iForest - Biogeosciences and Forestry

Contents

Search

Journal Info

Journal Subjects and Fields

For Authors

For Reviewers

For Readers

SISEF Publishing

Search iForest Contents