Western Taïga

Description (English)

Natural old forests as well as those young forest stages naturally developing after fire. Natural old forests represent climax or late succession stages with slight human impact or without any human impact. Present natural old forests are only minor remnants of those originally occurring in Fennoscandia. With intensive forestry, which is carried out practically throughout the countries, the main features of natural old forests disappear, i.e. the considerable amount of dead and rotten wood, the great variation in tree age and length and species composition, the trees from previous generations, the more stable microclimate. Old natural forests are habitats of many threatened species, especially bryophytes, lichens, fungi, and invertebrates (mostly beetles). Some of the present old natural forests have human impact, but in spite of that they maintain many characteristics of the natural forests.
Because of the important role of fire, burned forest areas, and their young succession stages, have been naturally common in the boreal region. Nowadays they are extremely rare because of the efficient fire protection and forestry. Natural recently burned forest areas are very important habitats to many endangered species. Typical for natural burned areas is the great amount of dead burned wood and the varying amount of living trees which greatly conditions the regeneration of the forest.
The character of the forests vary with the different boreal zones (hemi-, southern, middle, northern) and different site types.
The following subtypes are distinguished, according to the main tree species and site type variation:
- natural old spruce forests
- natural old pine forests
- natural old mixed forests
- natural old trivial deciduous forests
- recently burnt areas
- younger forests naturally developed after fire