Environment Minister Ursula Heinen-Esser presents this year's NRW Forest Condition Report: "Our forests are in a worrying condition. This is because the combined effect of storms in the spring, followed by extreme summer drought and then heavy bark beetle infestation in the coniferous forests means that the damage this year is considerable."
Thus, 39 percent of the trees surveyed show clear crown thinning and another 39 percent show weak crown thinning, i.e. leaf loss. This leaves only 22 percent without crown defoliation. Since the field surveys on crown condition had to be completed in August for methodological reasons and the evaluations on the full extent of bark beetle damage are still ongoing, the actual forest damage is likely to be even greater.
2018: First storm, then drought, finally bark beetle
North Rhine-Westphalia was particularly hard hit by Hurricane Friederike in January. 2.5 million solid cubic metres of "storm wood" were produced. The months of April to August were the warmest and sunniest and at the same time the months with the least precipitation since the German Meteorological Service began keeping records in 1881. The bark beetle species "spruce bark beetle" and "copper bark beetle" proliferated in the spruce forests due to the wood that had accumulated as a result of the storm and the summer drought, which severely weakened the trees' defences. Spruce forests cover about one third of the forest area in North Rhine-Westphalia. The current state of the surveys suggests that this is the largest bark beetle calamity in several decades.
Task Force "Bark Beetle
In order to cope with the current difficult situation for the North Rhine-Westphalian forestry sector, Minister Heinen-Esser recently set up a "bark beetle" task force. This task force will primarily work to ensure that the damaged wood is removed from the forest as quickly as possible and that a further mass reproduction of bark beetles next year can be contained as far as possible.
Requirements due to climate change
Minister Heinen-Esser: "In addition to the acute measures, however, it is also important for the state government to develop forests that are more stable and resistant to climate change in the longer term. To this end, the new silviculture concept for North Rhine-Westphalia and other supporting instruments for forest owners will be presented shortly. Important information for forest management will soon be offered in a modern and user-friendly way via the new internet portal 'Waldinfo.NRW'."
Background to the State of the Forest Report:
The vitality of forest trees is recorded annually according to a uniform nationwide method. For this purpose, the condition of the tree crowns of about 10,000 trees is assessed by forestry experts for North Rhine-Westphalia and other factors are also taken into account. The forest condition has deteriorated since the beginning of the survey in 1984. Since about 2000, the damage measure has remained at a roughly constant high level with annual fluctuations. The annual forest condition report also includes supplementary technical information that is not represented by the method in the narrower sense (z. B. this year statements on amounts of damaged wood).
The new instruments for forest management in climate change are part of the climate adaptation strategy for forests and forest management in North Rhine-Westphalia. Important implementation projects are the new silviculture concept NRW, the state-wide forest location map and the new forest information system NRW (here especially the new internet portal Waldinfo.NRW). Also relevant here are the forest-relevant specialist information systems on climate change.
State of the Forest Report 2018
Source: from 21.11.18
Keywords: DE-News, Wood construction, Sustainable management, News Blog NRW, Ecology, Economics
