• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.95 no.2
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• pp.160-167
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• 2006

Most of the forest fires that occur in South Korea are caused by human. We partitioned South Korea into nine districts and used observed weather data and daily fire occurrence records for the 1994 to 2003 period to develop a human-caused fire occurrence model of South Korea. Logistic regression analysis techniques were used to relate the probability of a fire day to Fine Fuel Moisture Code (FFMC) component of the Canadian Forest Fire Danger Rating System. The probability of the number of fire day was increased as FFMC increased in the nine districts of South Korea.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.96 no.5
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• pp.533-538
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• 2007

This study was conducted in the spring of 2005 through personal interviews to examine the opinions of forest products manufacturers and consumers about the perspective of forest certification in South Korea and to characterize those consumers who expect the activation of a forest certification system in South Korea. Study results indicated that consumers showed more positive aspect for the activation of forest certification than forest products manufacturers. Respondents who had a negative view for establishing a forest certification system in South Korea pointed out a lack of customers' demand for certified wood products as the most important reason. Results also showed that, even when a forest certification system would be introduced as a possible policy for helping to attain sustainable forest management, it would take at least 5 to 10 years to establish a forest certification system in South Korea. To facilitate the establishment of the system, many respondents suggested that an increased public awareness of forest certification systems was the most required precedent condition, and government for manufacturers and forest management association for consumers had to certify forest management practices as a competent organization. A profile of consumers who expected the activation of a forest certification system would describe in relative terms as the highly educated female who interviewed in the city of Seoul and of the 20 age bracket. Although there were an increased public awareness and positive prospective of forest certification by consumers and forest products manufacturers, it is required to arouse much more interest of consumers about the system.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.98 no.5
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• pp.593-601
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• 2009

Forest disturbances including forest fire, insect pests and diseases, landslides, and forest conversion from 1976 to 2005 were investigated to trace the changes of major forest disturbance agents and their characteristics over time in accordance with changes in natural and social environment in South Korea. While the damaged area by insect pests and diseases continuously decreased for the past 30 years, damaged areas by forest fire and landslide were fluctuating through years. The interval of large forest fires has become shorter with increased tree volume. The precipitation between January and April were significantly correlated with large fire occurrences as Pearson's correlation coefficient -0.400 (P=0.029). The composition of major insect pests and diseases damaging Korean forests has been changed continuously, and become more diversified. While damages by pine caterpillar (Dendrolimus spectabilis) and pine needle gall midge (Thecodiplosis japonensis) decreased, damage by introduced pests has been more serious recently. The change of precipitation pattern that brought more localized heavy rain or powerful typhoon resulted in the recent increase in landslide areas. The major land uses to induce forest conversion have been changed, reflecting the changes in industrial structure in South Korea as agriculture and mining in 1970s, mining and golf ranges classified in pasture in 1980s, and road and housing construction in 1990s and 2000s. Changes in forest disturbance patterns in South Korea show that a country's industrial development is jointly working with global warming on forest stand dynamics. Altering energy structure and land use pattern induced by industrial development accumulates forest volume and reforms microenvironments on forest floor, interacting with climate change, inducing shorter interval of large forest fire and changes in major species composition of forest insect pests and diseases.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.96 no.2
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• pp.197-202
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• 2007

This study is conducted to investigate the factors affecting lumber conversion rate of sawmill industry in South Korea. Data were obtained from the survey of 38 sawmills in all geographic regions of South Korea. The variables examined in this study were region, softwood/hardwood log, domestic/imported/both log, the number of power-driven carriages (PDC) installed, the year when and country where PDCs was manufactured, the horse power of PDC, the number of labors required to operate each PDC, the sawing capacity of mill (mill size), and the types of major product and by-products. The lumber recovery factor (LRF) of sawmills were significantly influenced by the origin of logs, level of PDC automation, sawmill size, and size of logs (measured in diameter and length) while not by the location of the mill, types of major product and by-product, log species, and characteristics of PDC. Although these results provide useful information for understanding the technological characteristics of the Korean sawmill industry, further investigation with larger sample is necessary to reveal the more reliable characteristics of sawmill industry in South Korea.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.99 no.2
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• pp.163-171
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• 2010

Forest fires have potentials to change the structure and function of forest ecosystems and significantly influence on atmosphere and biogeochemical cycles. Forest fire also affects the quality of public benefits such as carbon sequestration, soil fertility, grazing value, biodiversity, or tourism. The prediction of fire occurrence and its spread is critical to the forest managers for allocating resources and developing the forest fire danger rating system. Most of fires were human-caused fires in Korea, but meteorological factors are also big contributors to fire behaviors and its spread. Thus, meteorological factors as well as social factors were considered in the fire danger rating systems. A total of 298 forest fires occurred during the fall season from 2002 to 2006 in South Korea were considered for developing a logistic model of forest fire occurrence. The results of statistical analysis show that only effective humidity and temperature significantly affected the logistic models (p<0.05). The results of ROC curve analysis showed that the probability of randomly selected fires ranges from 0.739 to 0.876, which represent a relatively high accuracy of the developed model. These findings would be necessary for the policy makers in South Korea for the prevention of forest fires.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.98 no.5
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• pp.568-575
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• 2009

Korean wild and forest cultivated ginseng has long been accepted as high medicinal values compared to field cultivated ginseng. Owing to the high price of Korean wild ginseng, Chinese wild and forest cultivated ginseng were smuggled and sold as Korean wild and forest cultivated ginseng. Therefore, an efficient method is required to distinguish Korean ginseng from Chinese ginseng. Microsatellites, simple sequence repeats (SSRs), are highly polymorphic loci present in DNA that consist of repeating units of base pairs. Thus SSR markers are highly advantageous for detection of small genetic variances of intra-species. In the present study, we constructed a microsatellite-enriched genomic library from South Korean wild Panax ginseng. After sequence analysis of 992 randomly picked positive colonies, 126 (12.7%) of the colonies were found to contain microsatellite sequences, and 38 primer pairs were designed. By polymorphism assessment using 36 primer pairs, 4 primers (PG409, PG450, PG491, and PG582) were shown to be polymorphic to distinguish the South Korean ginseng from the Chinese ginseng. These 4 microsatellite markers will provide powerful tools to authenticate South Korean ginseng from Chinese ginseng.

• The Korean Journal of Mycology
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• v.50 no.2
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• pp.115-123
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• 2022

Two new records of Scleroderma species from South Korea are described here. Comprehensive taxonomic studies of Scleroderma specimens were conducted at the Korea National Arboretum. Based on morphological and molecular data (fungal barcode sequences), two new records (S. laeve and S. nastii) were confirmed. Herein, morphological descriptions, including Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) images of basidiospore ornamentation, and a taxonomic key of Korean Scleroderma species are provided.

• Journal of Forest and Environmental Science
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• v.37 no.4
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• pp.338-340
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• 2021

Morus alba, known as White Mulberry, is one of the most common species of mulberry found in South Korea, along with M. australis, known as Korean Mulberry. During a routine survey to investigate fungal diseases on deciduous broad-leaved trees in 2020, leaf spots were consistently observed on the White Mulberry in Sejong-si (36°30'12.8"N 127°17'34.5"E) and Wonju-si (37°15'29.6"N 128°11'37.9"E), South Korea, with a disease incidence of approximately 70 to 80%. Symptoms included circular, tan or necrotic lesions surrounded by a dark margin on leaves, which, in some cases, the lesions coalesced to form relatively large necrotic regions. The pathogen was successfully isolated from M. alba, and was identified as Cladosporium pseudocladosporioides based on the phylogenetic analysis and morphology. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of leaf spot disease on M. alba caused by C. pseudocladosporioides in South Korea.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.96 no.2
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• pp.183-188
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• 2007

This study was carried out to examine the perceptions of consumers and forest product manufacturers in South Korea about forest certification and to identify their willingness-to-pay for certified products by personal interviews. Sixteen percent of interviewees knew and heard about forest certification. However, fifty-six percent of interviewees had an intention to participate in forest certification system. The consumers' group can be described in relative terms as the male of 30 age bracket. The average price premium charged to consumers was higher than one paid to manufacturers, and thus manufacturers are willing to include the additional costs for certified products.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.97 no.2
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• pp.187-195
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• 2008

Picea jezoensis (Sieb. et Zucc.) Carriere is one of the major and widespread components of the cold-temperate and boreal forests in Russian Far East, northeast China, Korea, and Japan. However, it is restricted to a highly fragmented range in South Korea with small populations. Mean expected heterozygosity $(H_e)$ based on 22 loci in 11 isozyme systems was 0.077 for four sampled populations that covered the whole distribution range of P. jezoensis in South Korea. This value is within the range reported for conifers, but it is very low compared to that of other spruce species as well as that of P. jezoensis populations in Russian Far East. Most populations had a slight excess of heterozygotes and the Wright's $F_{IS}$ (-0.019) was comparable to that previously reported for other spruce species. In all of the four populations, the Wilcoxon sign-rank test indicated no greater heterozygosity than that expected for populations at mutation-drift equilibrium, suggesting that the populations have not been bottlenecked recently. Despite a fragmented range and isolated populations, population differentiation was not high $(F_{ST}=0.047)$ and the number of migrants per generation was 5.09. Nei's genetic distances were also small $({\bar{D}}=0.005)$ but strongly related to geographic distances between populations, suggesting an Isolation by Distance. The northernmost isolate, Mt. Gyebang population was genetically distinct from the other three populations. Implications for the conservation of genetic variation of P. jezoensis in South Korea were discussed.