Forest Experiment Station celebrates its 90th anniversary

On October 5, 2016 the field ceremonial meeting of the Academic Board of the Russian Research Institute for Silviculture and Mechanization of Forestry (VNIILM) dedicated to the 90th anniversary of the branch of the Institute – Tatar Experiment Station (now – the East-European Forest Experiment Station) is set to be held. It was established in 1926 as a Forest Experiment Station “Tatarstan” as part of Kazan experiment forestry in Lopatino forest village of the former Yudinsky District of the Tatar ASSR as a research institution.

The main purpose of the Station was the solution of scientific and practical forestry issues, namely in key areas of forestry, forest inventory, forest protection, forest exploitation and the economy. The tasks that faced the research team were the study of the status and productivity of forests of Tartary, the study of different methods of forestry equipment usage, as well as the systematization and generalization of all research work of forest experiment institutions. When the issue of Station establishment in Kazan was addressed, the availability of high-quality forests on the border of taiga and forest-steppe, and the own Russian botanical and geographical school that has developed thanks to the works of Academician S.I. Korzhinsky and professor A.Ya. Gordyagin and their students in Kazan played the crucial role.

For 4 years the station was under the jurisdiction of the Forest Department of Tatnarkomzem; in 1930 it joined the Volga-Kama branch of the Forest and Floating Institute; in 1932 Tatar Experiment Station joined the VNIALMI system; starting from 1936 and up to now the station is a subdivision of VNIILM.

From 1938 to 1970, the scientists of the Station published the individual collections of works which had the great practical significance. In particular, in 1938-1939 four editions of the “Collection of Forestry and Forest Plantations” dedicated to improvement cuttings in pine forests and oak plantations (M.A. Anikin, D.I. Morokhin); study of pine fructification (P.D. Trusov); diseases of pine seedlings in nurseries and pests of oak plantations (V.V. Gulyaev, P.G. Troshanin, S.G. Timofeev, N.A. Petrova); the influence of pine twisting rust and May beetle on pine growth (P.G. Troshanin) were issued. In the first editions of the “Collection” there was a section “On-the-spot proposals” for the exchange of best practices among workers of forest establishments. From 1940 to 1970 in Kazan it was published under a different name – “Collection of Articles on Forestry”.

In 1948 on the territory of the Forest Experiment Station the employees of the station established the arboretum to which in 1981 the status of specially protected natural reservation of the Republic of Tatarstan – a natural monument “Kazan Arboretum” – was given. Currently, in the collection of the arboretum there are more than 50 species of trees and shrubs, including 22 species of the local flora and 29 species of flora of North America, the Far East, Western Siberia, the Caucasus and the Balkans. On the territory of the arboretum the excursions with students and schoolchildren of Kazan are arranged.

Over the years of its existence the Forest Experiment Station has accumulated enormous intellectual potential – about 1300 scientific works were published, more than 500 stationary experiment forest facilities. The library fund of the East European Forest Experiment Station is one of the oldest in the Volga region and contains more than 22 thousand items: books, field materials, research papers, dissertations of employees and stock materials since 1844.

Today East European Forest Experiment Station is engaged in scientific support of forest management throughout the Middle Volga and conducts its researches in creative collaboration with the Ministry of Forestry of the Republic of Tatarstan, Ministries of Forestry of the Chuvash Republic, the Republic of Mari El, as well as with Mari Technical University, Kazan higher educational institutions and Dresden University of Technology.