Coarse woody debris (CWD) is an important structural and functional component in forests in Northern Iran. In this study we determine the temporal patterns of CWD in Kheyroud Forests by examining the CWD volume in different decay classes and size classes along a chronosequence of secondary forest succession. The volume of CWD followed the general “U-shaped” temporal trend: the highest in the late successional forest (51.25 m³.ha^–1), lowest in the middle successional forest (25.95 m³.ha^–1) and intermediate in the early successional forest (37.05 m³.ha^–1). The late successional forest had a larger amount of logs, snags and stumps than the other two forests. In contrast, the snag volume did not differ between the late and middle successional forest. CWD in decay classes III and V was greater in the late successional forest than that in the other two forests, while CWD in decay classes II and I did not differ among the three successional forests. CWD in class II and I was significantly higher in the early successional forest than that in the middle successional forest. In the early and middle successional forests, CWD in early decay class was dominated by <I>Carpinus betulus</I> L. followed by <I>Fagus orientalis</I> Lipsky. In the late successional forest, CWD in early decay class was dominated by <I>Fagus orientalis</I> while CWD in the late decay class was dominated by <I>Carpinus betulus</I>. While forest succession had a large influence on the amount of CWD in different decay classes, it had no effect on CWD distribution among the different size classes. Our results suggest that both anthropogenic and natural disturbances have had a long-term effect on the distribution of CWD among three forests.

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There is an emerging interest in the relationships between forest structure and topographic aspects. Still, such patterns have been scarcely studied in undisturbed mixed beech forests in northern Iran. We investigated the influence of topographical factors including aspect, slope degree, and landform index (LI) on the distribution of dominant tree species and coarse woody debris (CWD). Tree density and basal area were not significantly correlated with any of the measured parameters, except a moderate relation between basal area and LI (r = -0.376; P = 0.029). Redundancy analysis (RDA) of the tree layer revealed a significant relationship between the measured environmental variables and species distributions. CWD volume showed significant negative correlation with percent canopy coverage and was highly correlated with slope. Density of CWD in decay class IV was significantly correlated with aspect and percent of canopy cover. Analyses of CWD distributions in relation to both living vegetation and topographic gradients showed a highly complex interplay of factors driving the distribution of CWD across the forest stands.

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Aim of study: This study aimed to examine the dead wood inhabiting macrofungi communities occurring on dead beech and hornbeam trees in Caspian forests.Area of study: The Kheiroud forest in the north of Iran. Material and Methods:Data from 205 sampling dead tree were analyzed by means of Generalized Linear Models (GLM) to test the effects of decay stage, DBH, Length or Height on macrofungi diversity. Additionally, tree species, dead wood size, log position, decay stage were used as predictor factors for the number of sporocarps species (NSS) as a fungal species richness and diversity in each dead log using analysis of varianceMain results: The number of sporocarps species (NSS) varied in different dead wood size and decay classes. The different stages of decay and the different size classes of dead wood had significantly different species richness of macrofungi. Deadwood in the high-decayed stages contained the highest diversity of fungi. Most of fungi identified on both logs and snags belonged to Basidiomycetes and Ascomycetes. The highest value for richness and evenness indices calculated in large diameter dead wood in decay class III. The results indicated the size and decay class of dead wood describe the greatest variance of the model that means the highest number of sporocarps species inhabited on the large dead wood in advanced stage of decaying.Research highlights: Macrofungi diversity varied significantly across pieces of dead wood with downed logs, larger pieces, and wood in later stages of decay having the highest macrofungi diversity.Keywords: Caspian forest; coarse woody debris; down woody debris; Iran. Citation: Sefidi, K., Etemad, V. (2015). Dead wood characteristics influencing macrofungi species abundance and diversity in Caspian natural beech (Fagus orientalis Lipsky) forests. Forest Systems, Volume 24, Issue 2, eSC03, 9 pages. http://dx

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