The role of Scots pine stand in the development of the phytocoenosis in an oak-lime-hornbeam forest habitat
A regeneration process of oak-lime-hornbeam community (Tilio-Carpinetum typicum Tracz. 1962), developing after a clear cutting followed by a plantation of Scots pine stand, is analyzed. A study material comes from managed and strictly protected part of the Białowieża Primeval Forest. A series of managed Scots pine stands, comprising developmental phases from thicket to old-growth, is compared with an analogical series of managed pedunculate oak stands (in case of managed stands considered to be in a harmony with a target tree species composition for a given site type), as well as with a series of natural (strictly protected since ca. 80 years) stands, occurring in the Białowieża National Park.
The three experimental variants, occurring in similar site conditions, are compared with regard to the vegetation and stand structure, as well as to the chemical properties of two uppermost soil layers.
The development of Scots pine stands on the sites of oak-lime-hornbeam community, under the conditions of the Białowieża Forest, has not brought about neither a site degradation nor any pinetization of the community (un- derstood as a steadily increase of floral elements occurring normally in natural Scots pine stands). The acidifying influence of pine needle litter on the site and ground layer vegetation was balanced, or even overridden, by processes asso- ciated with the regeneration of the phytocoenosis, first of all by the influence (shading and litter fall) of a rapidly developing hornbeam layer.
Intensive regeneration processes of natural oak-lime-hornbeam community, supported by site eutrophization, caused by the input of air-born chemicals and climate warming, lead to the growing discrepancy between Scots pine stands and site conditions. The obtained results suggest that the restoration of more natural conditions in the replacement Scots pine stands can be achieved in a greater extent, than previously assumed, by a means of spontaneous rege- neration processes.
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