Morphometry of the crown of Araucaria angustifolia in natural sites in southern Brazil

Abstract

In forest management, it is necessary to understand the morphometric relationships to provide information about the characteristics of the morphological adjustment of the crown caused by competition for environmental resources in forest communities. In this study, we analyzed the generated morphometric characteristics with inter-dimensional equation fit for individual trees of Araucaria angustifolia in different sites of the Araucaria Forest in Southern Brazil, checking if there are different morphological responses of the crown according to different stem dimensions. To do this, samples were taken from 186 trees in a single-tree based approach on the extent of forest diameter distribution; dendrometric and morphometric variables were measured. The increase in diameter was obtained through the chronology of ring widths. The adjustment results in mixed models show that the species differs in the proportion of the crown among sites. The equations have been able to explain the relation between form and size. Changes in morphology are related to competition and changes in diameter at breast height, which indicates that forest management should be based on morphometric differences to propose silvicultural interventions in the forest, thus resulting in a positive way in increasing the growth rates of individual trees.