Survival and height of pedunculate oak (Quercus robur L.) in Chrostowa I experimental trial in Brzesko Forest District

The paper presents the results of a provenance-x-family experiment measuring traits in the progeny of 4 provenances and 25 families of Quercus robur. The height and survival of trees were monitored at an experimental site located in the Brzesko Forest District in the Wisnickie foothills. The heritability of height was estimated from data collected during the years 1995-2007. The survival rate of young seedlings from lowland provenances was high, and this suggests that these populations should be used for oak plantations in the Carpathians. At 15 years old, the progeny of the Tronçais provenance from the Massif Central, France, is performing very well under the conditions of the trial in the Wisnickie foothills, maintaining comparable survival and significantly superior growth to the Polish provenances. However, its superiority over the best Polish provenance, Zaporowo, has been steadily decreasing with age. Growth differed significantly among provenance populations in each year of measurement, and the effect of family within provenance has tended to increase over time. The provenance heritability of height (0.53 to 0.91) is higher than the family and individual heritability. Up to the age of 11 this value increased with age, however from age 11-15 it decreased slightly. By contrast, the family and individual heritabilities had decreased to zero by the year 2001 (age 9), but have since started to rise again. This reversal can be attributed to increased differentiation between the progenies of individual trees within provenances.