THE INFLUENCE OF URBAN ENVIRONMENT FACTORS ON THE GROWTH OF HORSE CHESTNUT AESCULUS HIPPOCASTANUM L.

Aim of the study: In the years 1995–1999, at 21 sites within the broadly understood center of Poznań, research on the development of chestnut Aesculus hippocastanum L. was carried out. As part of this research, selected environmental factors were analysed. The aim was to become familiar with the conditions of tree development in the urban and industrial agglomeration of Poznań. Material and methods: Knowledge of tree development limiting factors in urban conditions allows to take actions that will eliminate them or limit their negative impact on the development of trees, including their biometric parameters. The implementation of such actions will neutralise or compensate for undesirable processes in the urban environment. As a consequence, it will allow for unlimited environment-generating functions by trees such as: CO2 assimilation, oxygen release, water vapour transpiration, dust retention, phytoncide production or noise suppression. Results and conclusions: Research on the development of 35 chestnut trees at 21 streets included: seasonal periodicity of trees, recording air temperature and humidity, physico-chemical analysis of the substrate, biometric measurements and, at eight sites, selected physiological parameters, such as photosynthesis and transpiration. In total, over 17,000 numerical data about the environment were collected. The graphs in this paper present mainly the relationship between environmental parameters and biometric measurements at a highly significant level in terms of statistics, i.e. for p ≤ 0.01.