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European beech is a successful tree species outside its distribution range in northeastern Europe, where Prussian foresters introduced it mainly into Scots pine stands. This forest management practice resulted in new issues related to the sensitivity of European beech to current environmental changes in areas outside its natural range. We hypothesized that recent global environmental changes promoted the northeast migration of European beech outside its distribution range in Europe. To test this hypothesis, dendrochronological analysis of beech tree ring series was performed for eight sites located in Poland, Lithuania and Latvia. Frost in winter months and heat in June, along with drought in the vegetation period, limited beech tree growth outside its natural distribution range in northeast Europe. Higher air concentration of surface ozone and sulphur deposition level reinforced the negative effect of the detected key meteorological variables on beech growth, while higher air concentrations and deposition of nitrate had a positive effect. These factors explained about 50% of the total variation in increment indexes of beech trees at sites on the northeasren edge of their range. The observed trends of beech growth over the last 25 years has determined favorable conditions for planting this tree species outside its natural range in northeastern European forests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dead wood is one of the most important indicators of forest naturalness and the most important manageable habitat for biodiversity in forests. Standing and lying dead wood, and especially coarse woody debris, plays an important part in creating habitats for many highly specialized organisms, e.g., insects, fungi, lichens and bacteria. Temperate mixed deciduous forests, rich in species, have been studied only to a small extent from the point of view of the ecology of wood-related cryptogams. Our study aimed at the reduction of the gap in knowledge about the ecological characteristics of dead wood-dependent organisms by focusing on species of cryptogams developing on various dead wood structures typical of temperate non-beech forests. Studies were performed in forests located in Lithuania, Poland, Belarus and Russia. We recorded 48 species of cryptogams: 18 species of bryophytes, 24 species of fungi and 6 species of lichens developing on dead wood. Our study stresses the importance of all types of dead wood as a substrate for the development of rare cryptogam species. Logs were the most important substratum type for cryptogams, followed by snags, dead trees and stumps. The cryptogam species richness on logs was several times higher than on the three other types of substrata. Coarse logs of intermediate decay stages hosted the highest number of cryptogams, followed by freshly fallen logs and, finally, well decayed logs. Assessing the importance of dead wood quality for the studied cryptogams, we found that intermediate decay stages are extremely important for fungi, while bryophytes or lichens do not show a clear preference. The highest number of cryptogams was found on Fraxinus excelsior, Quercus robur and Picea abies, while other tree species had less than half cryptogam species. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Understanding how the planting of non-native species impacts native vegetation is of most importance for forest management, as introduced species may alter environmental conditions with respect to soil composition, light intensity, and species composition. Here, we compared the stand structure, understory vegetation and site properties of a natural Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) stand with Norway spruce (Picea abies (L.) Karst.) and European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) as the second tree layer. We recorded saplings and species and their abundance in the understory vegetation, the thicknesses of organic (O) and humus (A) soil layers, soil pH and light indexes in nine Scots pine stands with a second tree layer of beech and in nine control pine stands with a second tree layer of spruce. An ordination method was used to analyze all the data together and ANOVA to determine whether there were differences between stands. We found that species diversity in pine stands with planted beech as the second layer was lower than in pine stands with spruce as the second layer. In pine stands with beech as the second tree layer, shrub, herb and moss cover was significantly lower, and the soil humus layer and organic soil layer were thicker and thinner, respectively. Stand parameters such as mean volume and mean annual increment of the second tree layer were significantly higher in pine stands with planted beech as the second tree layer than in pine stand with spruce as the second tree layer. The mean volume and the mean annual increment of the first tree layer dominated by Scots pine did not differ significantly between stands with planted beech and those with natural spruce. Scots pine stands with a beech second layer had negative effects on understory species richness and abundance. This effect was most likely due to the lower light transmittance and poor physical properties of the forest-floor litter in the Scots pine stands with planted beech. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to develop a screening approach for genetic tolerance to industrial pollution in Scots pine. The relationship between temporal variation in strength of genetic control on radial increment of seed orchard clones affected by air pollution and past pollutant emissions from a nitrogen fertilizer plant in central Lithuania was assessed. The annual radial increment was measured from increment cores. High present-day defoliation was associated to low radial increment during intensive pollution period in the years 1992 - 1995 when high defoliation was recorded in the stands. There was a tendency for a stronger genetic control of radial increment during the years of high defoliation. The clones representing the extremes of high and low radial increments during the stress period of 1992 - 1995 were selected for further tolerance testing based on needle anatomy traits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]