Condition and Growth of Scots Pine Seedlings under Strong and Weak Pollution in Kola Peninsula

摘要

Anthropogenic stress has affected forest trees for decades and will continue to do so in the foreseeable future. The Scots pine tree condition was evaluated and tree height was measured at age twelve in provenance field trial established on two sitesunder strong and weak pollution levels in Kola Peninsula, NW Russia. The seedlings of three Finnish origins (Muonio, Ylitornio and Suomussalmi) were used for establishment of the trial. Based on needle, bud and stem observations, the evaluation of the condition was performed. Surprisingly the condition was better and trees were slightly taller on the strongly than weakly polluted site with significant differences among some provenances from northern Finland. The trees had a significantly higher condition (p<0.05) in the northernmost provenance (Muonio) than in the more southern ones (Ylitornio and Suomussalmi) under weak pollution. On the strongly polluted site, the differences between provenances were insignificant. Thus the dead forest area around Monchegorsk is most successfully reforested, when using artificial reforestation with local or more northern Scots pine seed sources.