The Forestry Research Area in Liliental

The Experiment Areas

In contrast to the majority of agricultural culture-plants forest trees are organisms that can become decades, centuries or occasionally even millennia old. Experiments with forest trees are therefore generally established for the long-term, since statements about site suitability, growth characteristics or timber quality are only possible after many years of observation. At the moment there are so called clone and genetic investigations as well as provenance and cultivation experiments with cherry, service tree, wild service tree, walnut, sycamore, apple, pear and spruce.

During a clone test vegetatively propagated (genetically identical) seedlings of different tree species (clones) are tested. Genetic investigations on the other hand observe the generative seedlings of forest trees, i.e. half and full siblings. In both cases the principal question is whether or not certain external characteristics of the young trees are genetically determined or not. Provenance experiments are meant to help explain how the progeny of a tree species from different parts of the natural range behaves under the same site conditions. Recommendations for the forestry industry can be made as a result of these investigations. Cultivation experiments are designed to explain whether or not and under which conditions non-native tree species in central Europe can be cultivated.