Forest damages by wild ungulates in Tuscany Region: evaluation methods and data collection

Abstract

Wildlife management in agroforestry territories has become particularly complex in recentyears because of the increase in wild ungulate density. In many forest areas, damage by wildlifeoccurs particularly from browsing of forest regeneration, bark stripping, and mechanical stresson the trunk of the trees. In this paper, we describe the theoretical aspects of assessing forestdamage by wild ungulates in the Region of Tuscany. In addition, we have defined datacollection methods (e.g., prices of timber and costs of forest harvest and logging) necessary forthe realization of a model to be used in estimating forest damage by wild ungulates.