Silviculture and Management Strategy in Coniferous Forests

Dear Colleagues,

Major coniferous forests such as those with pine, larch, fir, and spruce species are popular forest types and important in forestry, playing a pivotal role in yielding valuable timber productions. These forests can be artificially or naturally regenerated depending on the management goals and strategies and have been studied for their optimal growth and yield, considering not only profitability but also other forest management effects from various breeding trials, nursery, silvicultural treatments, and fertilization. Past studies have faced changing environments due to issues occurring from climate change, socio-economic interests, biodiversity, changing habitats, and forest damage due to insects and pests. Nonetheless, the studies on managing major coniferous forests have dealt with such problems by updating their strategies.

Major coniferous forests provide quality timber and forest products. In addition, these forests have significant potential for carbon storage. Consequently, the silvicultural treatment and stand management of forests are of great interest in forestry and relevant industries.

This Special Issue aims to discuss the current status of major coniferous forests with different species across the world in order to share better strategies for forest stand management.

Potential topics include (but are not limited to):

• Stand structure and growth characteristics of coniferous forests with long-term monitoring;
• Comparison of economic, social, and environmental value in management between naturally regenerated and artificially regenerated coniferous forests;
• Effect of silvicultural treatments including planting spacing, cleaning, pruning, and thinning on coniferous forests;
• Regeneration methods and studies in coniferous forests;
• Growth and yield models of coniferous forests;
• Studies on breeding for improved materials on coniferous forests;
• Effects of fertilizer, edaphic characteristics, and site- or climate-driven variables on coniferous forests;
• Current status, challenging issues, and potential solutions when it comes to managing coniferous forests (e.g., disease, fire, social resistance, or policy);
• Future of coniferous forests and the expected environments in terms of forestry and timber production;
• Social impacts and/or questionnaire with stakeholders in coniferous forests;
• Pros and cons of coniferous forests compared to broadleaved forests in management at the regional, national, and/or international level;
• Opportunity or threat of carbon issues in coniferous forests;
• Woody and non-woody products from coniferous forests;
• Practical management strategies in coniferous forests.

Dr. Daesung Lee
Prof. Dr. Jungkee Choi
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Forests is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.