Thinning is one of the most important silvicultural activities in middle aged forests, partly to minimize damages and partly because it leads to earlier harvesting revenues and increases the value of the remaining trees. There are many different indices used to describe stand density and thereby the need of thinning in forests today. Studies have shown that forest variables can be estimated with high accuracy using airborne laser scanning and it is likely that the method could also be used to estimate forest density indices. In this study, the possibility of using the forest density index ?H² to determine and map priorities for thinning operations for a forest area was examined.

Communication, information and marketing are three of the main prerequisites for companies that want to increase their turnover. The everyday work for a Forest Manager within the forest owners? association Mellanskog consists to a large part of interpersonal communication, either by close vicinity contact or by phone calls. Interpersonal communication is time consuming and resource intensive. If the flow of information, communication and marketing does not function well then there is a lack of a base for development.

This final thesis is initiated by the wood fuel department at the Swedish forest company Sveaskog as part of a project which also involves two other final thesises. The overall goal of the project is to investigate Sveaskog´s possibilities to produce and sell different wood fuel assortments in Västerbotten and the southern parts of Norrland. The aim of this thesis is to investigate how much wood fuel Sveaskog can produce in the area during the next five years and what that would cost. Furthermore the thesis will investigate the total possible supply of wood fuel from all other possible producers in the area. Treated assortments are forest residues from final fellings, whole trees from direct wood fuel thinnings, non industrial wood and industrial by-products from sawmills. The main effort to investigate Sveaskog´s production possibilities has been made to calculate the possible annual amount of forest residues and fuel from wood fuel thinnings that can be produced.

Inside the south Swedish national park Dalby Söderskog, wild boars (Sus scrofa L.) have been visiting since 2010. The presence of wild boars has earlier been proven to impact both soil and vegetation characteristics, both positively and negatively. Still, there is a lack of knowledge regarding the rooting effect on the vegetation in deciduous forest within the native range. In this study, I have compared the field vegetation collected before and after the invasion of wild boars in 74 permanent experimental plots. More specifically, the study aimed to qualify the effect of wild boar rooting on cover ratio, species richness and species composition in a temperate deciduous forest.

AbstractParticiapation from the citizens in a democratic society is one of the ground pilars for the function of the democratic society. The goal for the Swedish contemporary democracy is to complement the representative democracy with different kinds of participatory activities for the citizens. But is it working? The purpose of this essay is to exame the problems that might occur when the citizens participate in a wider extent than just voting. The focus is problems connected to the democratic value political equality.

Sycamore maple (Acer pseudoplatanus L.) is a common broadleaved species throughout Europe, however often of minor interest to the forest sector. There is currently a lack of research on sycamore maple, and some of its characteristics have throughout history contributed to a negative reputation in both literature and the forest society. Since broadleaved species in general are of great importance to the forest sector in Europe and presumably of enhanced significance in the future, deepened research is needed and particularly Swedish. With a desire to hopefully increase the interest for sycamore maple, was the objective of the study to examine the current status of the sycamore stands in southern Sweden. The study was carried out both as a survey with inventory field work and as a literature study. Parts of the latter mentioned is also presented in the introduction. The study shows that the majority of the sycamore stands in Sweden are growing well, producing fairly high qualities and volumes.

Along with other European farmland birds, the skylark (Alauda arvensis) has declined rapidly since the 1970?s. Between 1975 and 2003, the Swedish population of skylarks declined with 64 %. In Britain, the decline is often explained by alterations in farming practices in general and the shift from spring-sown to winter-sown cereals in particular. The dense vegetation structure of winter cereals is limiting the number of breeding attempts possible, causing the entire population to decline.

The purpose of this work is to find out what female students think about Skogsmästarprogrammet (Forest Management ? Bachelor?s Programme) at the Swedish University of Agriculture. The programme has existed since 1945 and in total over the years 1974 - 2007 about 10 % females have been studying at the programme. Today 15 % of the students are women, and the goal is to reach at least 30 %. The central question in the present work is to investigate how it is possible to increase the proportion of women.

Information is one of the organization's essential resources, and as such it needs strategic management. The authors use the information audit, which was developed by Orna 1999 and Henczel 2000 as a tool to evaluate how well an organization's information activities connect to its mission, goals, and objectives, to evaluate the municipal politicians' information support in Härryda municipality. The decision situations met by politicians often are complex; they are ambiguous and unstructured, with a high level of uncertainty. Human information sources meet needs arising in this kind of decision situations best. Since most of the politicians work full-time besides being politicians, Härryda municipality has to substitute the human sources by textual ones composed of highly summarized information.

Wind and wind damage has become a hot subject because of the storm ?Gudrun? in January 2005. The main purpose of this study was to establish how the land owners attitude toward preventive wind damage actions was changing immediately after they had been struck by a storm. The result of the study was built on interviews. In springtime 2005 a total number of 20 private land owners were interviewed. Ten of the landowners lived in the province of Småland and ten in the province of Värmland.

This Masters Thesis includes a survey of recreational habits and the attitudes towards forests of the people of Sätra, a suburb of the city of Gävle. The study also includes the planning and design of a forest suited for education in the same part of the city. The thesis is a part of a project called Tätortsnära skog, commissioned by the Swedish forest agency. The project aims to survey the recreational habits of the general public in the regions of Dalarna and Gävleborg. Tätortsnära skog is focused on cities with a population of more than 20 000 inhabitants, of which Gävle, Sandviken, Falun and Borlänge all fall within the category.

The work presented here aims to give the owners ofChâteau du Grand Val, Roland and Marie Nilssond?Aubigné an integrated creative forest management planin which their goals with the property is heeded, andwhere the plan is so clear that they can follow it withoutmuch difficulty.This work has come about through the normal processesof forest management plans, landscape architecturalproposals as well as through field trips, field andliterature studies, and our combined experience fromour studies. The study visits, both on location in Brittany,France, but also in other places, as for instance Högestad,has provided the background information that formedthe basis of our analysis and the proposal that is derived thereof. Some suggestions, which we consider importantto the overall impression of the property, is provided amore focused and detailed solution, while other parts,which are important but can either benefit from havingdynamics in the design process or will be adapted toadjacent sites, are developed using a more generalapproach. In some cases several possible developmentprinciples are presented.The proposal presents a detailed plan for themanagement of the forest from the experience, wildlifeand forestry economic standpoint.

The aim of this study is to identify factors, which decide wheter you choose to commute with bicycle to work in the winterseason. The study is conducted in Umea, in the norhtern part of Sweden. The study is based on 509 answers from a webbased survey, conducted on municipal employees. The study has investigated which factors that affect different commuting groups from a gender perspective. The groups, which has been compared is motorists, wintercyclist and summercyclists.

This essay intends to provide an understanding of the developments in the right of public access and recreational activities in the forests of Sweden, and which factors and prerequisites that have affected this development. The forest and its history, along with recreational development has in many ways shaped today?s rights of public access, but there is also an age-old tradition of public access that has affected how we have used the forest, and that also has enabled the development of outdoor recreation. Many are unaware of this, which causes misunderstanding to appear around the rights of public access and how it is supposed to be used.The essay opens with historical descriptions of public access, the Swedish forest and outdoor recreation, to thereby provide a picture of how these three fields have influenced each other over the centuries. This is followed by a description of the current access rights and the problems associated with those, and a description of other countries' equivalent of the right of public access.

In the production of pulp, paper and cardboard, a large amount of water is used daily. The water has to be purified in the internal purifying plant before it reaches the receiving body of water. In the biological purifying stage at the Stora Enso Skoghall mill, an aerated basin is used where the microorganisms, using oxygen, oxidize the organic material to carbon dioxide. The air is pumped from the bottom of the basin and the oxygen can then be transported from the air bubbles to the water through diffusion. The problem with aeration of waste water from the forest industry is that wood residues, such as fatty acids, are making the transport of oxygen in water more difficult.