Effects of forestry practices on the regeneration and biodiversity of woody plants in the northern forest ecosystems of Iran

Abstract

Undoubtedly, the regeneration and sustainability of forests are the most important aspects of sustainable forest management. The present study was conducted in Patam district, located in Kheyroud forest, Iran, and the regular regeneration of various plant species was evaluated in the region. The study of the regeneration was randomly regularly carried out by using a grid of 150 × 200 m and the sample plot with the area of 1.0 R (radius 1.8 m), provided by centre for sample plot. The highest rate of regeneration (seedlings) was observed in Carpinus betulus (50%), Acer insigne (23%), Fagus orientalis (10%), afforestation (6.2%), Acer cappadocicum (6%), Parrotia persica (2.8%), and Diospyros lotus (2%), respectively. In addition, 74 and 26% of the seedlings had height less than and more than 50 cm, respectively. Therefore, the studied region has proper conditions for regeneration in terms of the soil and mother trees. However, the number of the seedlings with height more than 50 cm is not above the normal range. In the studied region, regeneration coverage level, herbaceous species coverage level, and coverage level without sample plots were calculated to be 52, 41, and 7%, respectively. Considering the low rate of natural regeneration compared to similar forests and the habitat of the studied forest, the main causes in this regard could be the lack of mother trees, animal grazing, and the density of the forest floor vegetation. Therefore, the elimination of animal grazing and plantation operations are necessary for the improvement of regeneration.

The Application of Improved Cuckoo Search in Cascade Reservoir Power Generation Optimized Operation

“…Due to unstable convergence results and the dimension disaster problem, traditional methods such as linear (or nonlinear) programming, dynamic programming, grid flow method and large-scale system have been replaced by intelligent algorithms such as ant colony algorithm, particle swarm optimization, and genetic algorithm (Su et al 2016, Guo et al 2010, Zhou and Ji 2007, Zhang et al 2013, Karami et al 2017, Haruna and Hanafiah 2017, Franco et al 2017, Sharma and Yadav 2017. The intelligent algorithm has the advantages of simple principle, parallel search and global optimization and easy application.…”

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