The purpose of this study was to examine how small-scale private forest ownersmake decisions regarding pre-commercial thinning. In 2015 it is ten years agosince the storm Gudrun hit the southern parts of Sweden and now large areas arein need of pre-commercial thinning. This study is built upon qualitativeinterviews with seven small-scale private forest owners with forest properties inthe county Kronoberg. The respondents were chosen by the modelSKOGSÄGARPROFILENTM (forest owner profile).The results of the interviews showed that five categories: ownership, the stormGudrun´s impact, silviculture, forestry contacts and driving force was important.How will their purpose and aim affect the pre-commercial thinning? Personalinterests, and expectations of the next generation to take over, are purposes thisstudy has found.

This is a study on the outcome of the Swedish Forest Agency´s mission to provide individual advice to private land owners about precommercial thinning. The study was conducted in Sala municipality and included forest owners that had received private individual advice from a Swedish Forest Agency consultant as well as forest owners that had not received individual advice. One of the central issues was to make comparisons between these two groups. The survey was carried out by telephone interviews combined with a smaller field study. The questions were designed to provide information about to what degree the forest owners had been affected by the advice and if there had been a change in the way in which precommercial thinning was performed. In terms of the amount of precommercial thinning that had been carried out, no statistically significant differences were found between the two groups.

Bergvik Skog is one of the leading forest companies in Sweden who use airborne laser scanning for forestry information. They utilize laser data retrieved by the Swedish National Land Survey to describe the forest holdings and facilitate planning for thinning and final felling operations. However, the possibility to identify stands with clearing needs by using laser scanning data has not been tested in a large scale. The data used in the current study are field data from The Swedish National Forest Inventory in combination with laser data from the Swedish National Land Survey acquired in 2009. The collected data is used to find one or several laser variables that best describe the relationship of the field measured samples with clearing needs.

Since the end of the eighteenth century forest damage caused by the pathogen Gremmeniella abietina has been observed and documented. During the latest epidemic in Sweden more than 480 000 hectares forest land have been injured and this has lead to considerable economic losses. For the pathogen to succeed with infection, spore dispersal and colonization the right environmental conditions is required. The aim of this paper is to describe the diseased stands using site and stand characteristics and to evaluate the effect of these variables on the disease incidence. Further, the thinning performed during the time for spore dispersal and its relationship to injured stands is examined.

In Korsnäs district Dala Väst there were problems with information concerning their younger forests, mainly those in pre-thinning stage. They were divided into large, heterogeneous stands with often poor stand data quality. In 2006 an aerial photo interpretation of the young forests was conducted to fix these problems. Necessary information to get from the interpretation were silvicultural management suggestions, new stand delineation and new stand data. This thesis is supposed to evaluate the quality and usability of the interpreted data. To evaluate the interpretation an objective control inventory was conducted in 60 stands, either through callipering or counting stems.

In Sweden, harvesting pre-commercial thinning (PCT) stems for energy purposes is a interesting way of financing the high cost of preparing dense stands for a profitable first conventional thinning. This concept can be labelled bioenergy thinning. The aim of this study was to quantify the productivity of a Vimek 404R light harvester with an accumulating Naarva-Grip cutting head during the bioenergy thinning of a self-regenerated stand west of Sunnansjö in Dalarna. The stand was birch-dominated, contained 15 371 stems/ha, and measured on average 4,6 cm Dbh and 7 m tall. Even though the driver was well experienced with the machine, the stand in question was the first one that he ever thinned in this manner. Nevertheless, the driver strived to accumulate as many stems as possible during each crane cycle and chose to cut taller stems in half so as to make the handling and forwarding of the harvested stems easier.

The aim of this report was to investigate the hypothesis that Norway spruce (Picea abies L. Karst), planted on poor ?Scots pine? stands will not have sustained growth during the whole rotation, due to water deficit in the closed stands. In order to investigate this hypothesis, data from 10 Norway spruce stands in southern-eastern Sweden were collected. In 10 plots in each stand, diameter and breast heights were measured on every tree.

The purpose of this study is to compare the economic differences between withdraw of forest fuel and withdraw of pulpwood in first thinning, to see which method gives the maximum profitability (income - cost). Another purpose is to investigate the economic impact of the thicket cleaning. The study compares four different methods: i) pulpwood output with thicket cleaning, ii) pulpwood output without thicket cleaning, iii) forest fuel output with thicket cleaning and iv) forest fuel output without thicket cleaning. The study was conducted in a 30-years old stand, dominated by spruce, outside Harg in Uppland. The method that generated the best economic net income was pulpwood without thicket cleaning. It generated a positive net of 1,383 SEK per hectare. Forest fuel output without thicket cleaning also generated a positive net in 720 kronor per hectare.

SCA har idag cirka 280 000 hektar beskogad med contortatall (Pinus contorta Dougl. ex Loud. var. latifolia Engelm). Stora delar av den arealen har kommit in i, eller är på väg in i, gallringsbar ålder.

Stora Enso Skog has a long term contract regarding felling rights and silvicultural activities on forest owned by Bergvik Skog. In the autumn 2006, Bergvik Skog proposed a new thinning program, ?Bergvikgallring?. The new program implied an increased focus on extraction of smaller trees compared to the present thinning program, Stora Enso Skog?s ?Kvalitetsgallring?.

This report is a B.Sc. Forestry thesis work at the school for Forest Management, SLU. The work was an assignment from the forest owners? association Mellanskog. The aim of the work where to investigate the economical result of removing undergrowth trees before first thinning, and a follow-up of the contractors and their compliance with Mellanskog standards. This thesis work was divided in three parts: The first was to find a relation between the net volume from the first thinning and the cost of cleaning undergrowth trees. Secondly there was a follow-up in the field, to investigate whether the contractors have done the undergrowth cleaning according to Mellanskog?s directives.

A common goal in practical forest management is to maximize the yield, measured in economical terms. When a forest stand is thinned a so called inoptimality loss can arise due to non-optimal decisions. This means that the selected management schedule results in a lower net present value than the optimal one which lowers the profitability for the forest owner. Holmen Skog uses the term tract which means an aggregation of stands made before a management action. A tract should be delineated in different tract parts in connection with pre-thinning planning if there is different bearing capacity within the tract, different thinning grades should be used or if the tract contains a weaker part that should not be thinned.

A high quality is highly requested in today?s thinnings, since these are the base for continued value development of the forests. Thinning quality often means a minimization of damages on soil, stems and roots during the cutting. One way to reach a high quality is to set up goals that will be followed up after the cutting is made. Self-checking gives information of the machine drivers work and guarantees the customers a good quality of work.

Modern forest owners are very familiar with forest management and forest economics. Therefore they have high demands for quality in forest operations. Guarantee of quality in the shape of self-checking activities is an important tool to guarantee a well managed forestry operation. To meet the forest owners? demands on guarantee of quality and the entrepreneurs wish of an easy method for self-checking, the forest owners association, Södra skogsägarna, has developed a new method for thinning inventory. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the method that is used for self-checking and to find ways to develop and improve of the method. The data has been collected by inventory in a number of stands with circle-area survey and with strip survey, which is method that is used for self-checking. The results show that the strip survey does not diverge more than ±10 % in measuring values of basal area, number of stems, roads share, thinning quotient, outtake of basal area and total volume compared to circle-area survey.

This report is a B.Sc. Forestry thesis work at the school for Forest Management, SLU. The work was an assignment from the forest owners? association Mellanskog. The aim of the work where to investigate the economical result of removing undergrowth trees before first thinning, and a follow-up of the contractors and their compliance with Mellanskog standards. This thesis work was divided in three parts: The first was to find a relation between the net volume from the first thinning and the cost of cleaning undergrowth trees. Secondly there was a follow-up in the field, to investigate whether the contractors have done the undergrowth cleaning according to Mellanskog?s directives.