Random Trees Are the Cornerstones of Natural Forests

Abstract

Natural forests serve as the main component of the forest ecosystem. An in-depth interpretation of tree composition and structure of forest community is of great significance for natural forest conservation, monitoring, management, and near-natural silviculture of plantation forest. In this study, we explored the importance of key tree groups—random trees—in natural communities, compared the similarity between the random trees and the communities. This research studies six stem-mapped permanent plots (100 × 100 m2) of the typical natural forests in three different geographic regions of China. Several variables and their distributions were applied to study community characteristics comprehensively, including species abundance, diameter distribution, spatial pattern, mingling, crowding, and competition. The genetic absolute distance method is used to analyze the similarity between the random trees and the communities. Our results show that the features of random trees are highly consistent with the communities. The study proposes that random trees are the cornerstones of natural forests. Its quantitative advantage explains the key role that random trees play in natural forests. The study could provide a scientific insight into the protection, monitoring, and management of forests.