The Relationship of Forest Fragmentation to Scots Pine Forest Mortality

Debebe Dana Feleha, Pawel Netzel () and Jakub Talaga
Additional contact information
Debebe Dana Feleha: Faculty of Forestry, Department of Forest Resources Management, University of Agriculture in Krakow, Aleja Mickiewicza 21, 31-120 Krakow, Poland
Pawel Netzel: Faculty of Forestry, Department of Forest Resources Management, University of Agriculture in Krakow, Aleja Mickiewicza 21, 31-120 Krakow, Poland
Jakub Talaga: Faculty of Forestry, Department of Forest Resources Management, University of Agriculture in Krakow, Aleja Mickiewicza 21, 31-120 Krakow, Poland

Land, 2025, vol. 14, issue 8, 1-19

Abstract: Forest mortality (FM) is influenced by several independent factors, including forest fragmentation (FF) at different spatial scales and multi-scales, site conditions, and stand characteristics. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship and effect of FF at various spatial scales on the probability of Scots pine FM. The presented study also analyzed the relationship of the multi-scale fragmentation index effect on forest dieback. The relationship between multiple stressors emphasizes the distinct role of FF in influencing pine FM probability. Data on forest cover, deadwood volume of Scots pine forest, and environmental variables were obtained from the Forest Information System for Europe, the Polish National Forest Inventory, and existing databases, respectively. A generalized additive model approach was used to develop models. The results showed that, at small (50–600 m), large (800–3000 m), and multi spatial scales, the FF effect on Scots pine FM probabilities was statistically significant. There is a partial effect of multi-scale fragmentation on the probability of Scots pine FM, given a holistic view of the fragmentation effect that captures both small and large-scale effects. The study concludes that to calculate FF for a particular area, analyzing different scales and capturing multi-scale level fragmentation indices is crucial to studying the cumulative effect of fragmentation on the probability of Scots pine FM.

Keywords: forest dieback; forest pattern effect; mortality probability; spatial scales (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/14/8/1537/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/14/8/1537/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jlands:v:14:y:2025:i:8:p:1537-:d:1710993

Access Statistics for this article

Land is currently edited by Ms. Carol Ma

More articles in Land from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().