Felling systems and regeneration of mangrove forests at Amphoe Muang, Changwat Ranong

Felling system and regeneration of mangrove forest was carried out at Khlong Tamngong Mangrove Forest Amphoe Muang, Changwat Ranong. Four permanent plots of 40*100 m in size of each were established on May 1989 which represent the clear cut with no planting, clear cut with planting, improvement cutting and control plot. Data were collected after establishing the permanent plot for four years. Natural regeneration, growth of Rhizophora apiculata seedling, forest structure and soils characteristics were investigated. The results revealed that natural regeneration including seedlings and saplings in the improvement cutting and control plots were rather good with the values of 33,330, 2,580 and 6,450, 3,070 stems/ha, respectively but in clear cut with no planting the densities of seedlings and saplings were 2,680 and 690 stems/ha, respectively. Growth of Rhizophora apiculata seedling in the clear cut with planting plot was better than that the improvement cutting plot. Forest structure including; species composition, density, height, diameter, basal area, volume and species diversity in the control plot has higher than improvement cutting plot except species composition and species diversity were lower. For soils properties in all four felling study plots were slightly different. Soil texture varied from silty loam to silty clay loam, low bulk density, colors ranged from pale brown to dark grey, soil reaction ranged from moderately acid to neutral (in situ.) ranged from very strongly acid to slightly acid when freeze dry and extreamly acid when air dry. The chemical analytical values of subsoils were relatively higher than that of the surface soils. Organic matter content, available potassium, cation exchangeable capacity, base saturation percentage, total sulphur and electrical conductivity ranged from high to very high. Sodium was the principal contributor to the total exchangeable bases. All soils were high nutrient.