Measuring damage to residual shrubs due to recreational activity in Fandoghlou forest

Fandoghlou forest is one of the most important recreational areas at regional and national levels, thus present study was aimed at determining the amount and intensity of damage to residual shrubs due to recreational activities in this forest. For this purpose, a part of forest that was as a forest parkand affected by recreational activities was selected. Using a grid of 50*50 meter, a number of 86 circular plots with the radius of 5m were selected in the region. The results showed that about 56% of plots were moderately and heavily damaged. In order to determine the most affected variable, three variables were selected and analyzed using factor analysis. The results of factor analysis showed that scar length extended around 71% of total variations of primary variables, alone. On the other hand, the results of one-way ANOVA and Tukey test showed that regarding to the amount of damage to shrubs, scar length and scar area, there is a significant difference among different categories of plots (p_value=0.000). The results also showed that there is a exponential relationship between the number of damaged shrubs and distance from the forest edge. Thus, it is concluded that recreational activities cause high damages to forest, hence rational planning and management should be conducted for reducing these damages.