Regeneration by sprouting of holm-oak (Quercus ilex) stands exploited by selection thinning

Holm-oak forests of the Montseny Massif have traditionally been exploited by selection thinning, which consists of a partial removal of standing trees and biomass. Cutting percentages within each size class indicate that this management technique represents a compromise between forest improvement and harvesting. Sprouting is the mean regeneration process of these holm-oak stands. The mean number of living sprouts per stool is considerably higher than in other coppiced hardwood species, and decreases along the cutting-cycle according to a negative exponential function. Mean number of surviving sprouts per stool is significantly correlated with regenerative age and stool size. Death of sprouts throughout the cutting cycle is compensated by growth of surviving sprouts. Thus, the weight of living sprouts per stool increases linearly with time, and also with the basal area coppiced. Sprouts developing within the first fifteen years of regeneration belong to a single cohort that appears during the first year after cutting. After that period of time, new sprouts appear from dormant buds, so that after 30 years of regeneration a wide range of cohorts of different ages are present. © 1992 Kluwer Academic Publishers.