Report on the forest condition in North Rhine-Westphalia

November 26, 2019

teaser-bild

The report on the forest condition 2019 for the federal member state of NRW has been published. This report shows in figures what is obvious when driving through our forest landscape.

The spruce is the most suffering tree species in the federal member state (and beyond). In 2018 and 2019, over 18.7 million cubic metres of damaged wood were produced (https://www.umwelt.nrw.de/fileadmin/redaktion/Broschueren/waldzustandsbericht_langfassung_2019.pdf) (German).

About a quarter of NRW (27%) is covered with forest, of which about a third (30%) with spruce forest (about 8% of NRW). If the state of the tree tops is taken as a measure of the state of health, then only about 22% of the spruce trees are healthy. Conversely, this means that about 78% of the spruces are damaged. This corresponds to about 6% of the land area or about 2200 km². For illustration this corresponds to 4 times the size of Lake Constance or the total area of the island of Tenerife. Deciduous trees such as beech and oak are also proportionately damaged to the same extent with regard to crown thinning. However, the figures are particularly alarming for spruce, which is currently the victim of the bark beetle as a result of weakening and drought stress.

back to overview