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Effects of dispersed and aggregated retention-cuttings and differently sized clear-cuttings in conifer plantations on necrophagous silphid and dung beetle assemblages

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Abstract

Retention forestry and small-sized clear-cuttings are thought to partially mitigate the impacts of logging. To evaluate the impacts of these two harvesting methods, a variety of logging operations were conducted in mature Sakhalin fir plantation forests in Hokkaido, northern Japan. The stands were logged with the following approaches: dispersed retention of naturally regenerated broad-leaved trees in large (100 trees/ha), medium (50), or small (10) amounts; 60 × 60 m aggregated retention; quadrilateral small-sized (ca 1-ha) clear-cutting; and whole clear-cutting. We collected necrophagous silphid and dung beetles from these stands and from unharvested natural broad-leaved forests and plantation forests using carrion-baited pitfall traps. All logging operations clearly affected the beetle assemblages. The 0.36 ha unharvested forest patches under aggregated retention did not act as refugia for forest species because their assemblages were almost identical to those outside the forest patches and in the whole clear-cuts. However, the total abundance of forest species and, specifically, the abundances of two dominant forest species were significantly and positively related to the trunk basal area of retained trees in the dispersed retention sites. The total abundance of forest species was significantly higher in the small clear-cuts than in the whole clear-cuts. A dominant open-land species was abundant in the harvested areas irrespective of the type of logging operation. Thus, we concluded that dispersed retention and small-sized clear-cuttings were beneficial harvesting methods for the beetle conservation because they conserved forest species compared to whole clear-cuttings and preserved the habitats of open-land species as well as whole clear-cuttings.

Implications for insect conservation

Our results indicated that large areas of unharvested forest patches are needed to conserve the habitat of forest necrophagous silphid and dung beetles, most species of which are adept at flying. Our results also indicated that the higher density of retained trees in dispersed retention forestry and the smaller areas of clear-cuttings were better for conserving forest species. Our findings provide useful information for selecting methods and designs of logging practices for species protection of flying insects in logged areas.

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Acknowledgements

We wish to thank the officials of the Fishery and Forestry Department of Hokkaido Prefecture and the local branch of the Sorachi Forest Office and researchers of the Forestry Research Institute, Hokkaido Research Organization, for their help with the REFRESH project. We also thank Kenichi Ozaki (FFPRI’s Hokkaido Res. Ctr.) and Nobuhiro Akashi (Forestry Research Institute, Hokkaido Research Organization), who helped us conduct this study, Satoshi Yamanaka (FFPRI’s Hokkaido Res. Ctr.) and Katsuhiko Sayama (FFPRI’s Kyushu Res. Ctr.) who helped us to conduct field work, Hideaki Goto, Meiko Nakamura, and Miwa Kawano (FFPRI’s Kyushu Res. Ctr.) who helped us to sort insect specimens and anonymous referees who made comments that led to considerable improvement of the text. This study was supported by Mitsui & Co., Ltd., Environment Fund (Grant No. R15-0025) and JSPS KAKENHI (Grant Nos. JP25252030 and 18H04154).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Kyushu Research Center, Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute (FFPRI), Kurokami 4-11-16, Chuo-ku, Kumamoto, 860-0862, Japan

    Akira Ueda

  2. Hokkaido Research Center, FFPRI, Hitsujigaoka 7, Toyohira-ku, Sapporo, 062-8516, Japan

    Akira Ueda, Hiroki Itô & Shigeho Sato

  3. Shikoku Research Center, FFPRI, Asakura Nishimachi 2-915, Kochi, 780-8077, Japan

    Shigeho Sato

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  1. Akira Ueda
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AU conceived the ideas and designed the methodology; AU and SS collected the data; AU and HI analysed the data; AU wrote the manuscript; all authors contributed critically to the drafts and gave final approval for publication.

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Correspondence to Akira Ueda.

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Appendix

Appendix

See Tables 4 and 5.

Table 4 Number of beetles captured in each collection period
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Table 5 Number of beetles captured in each trap
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Ueda, A., Itô, H. & Sato, S. Effects of dispersed and aggregated retention-cuttings and differently sized clear-cuttings in conifer plantations on necrophagous silphid and dung beetle assemblages. J Insect Conserv 26, 283–298 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10841-022-00386-3

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