In common traditional forest management (pollarding) in Armardeh, Baneh, Kurdistan province, Iran, each rural household usually owns an area of forest (locally called Galajar). The households divide their forest stands (i.e. Galajar) into three or four parts called shanegala and they sequentially pollard within three or four years period. The main objective of this traditional forest management is to produce fodder for livestock animals. The assessment of changes in biometric indices of oak trees due to pollarding, estimating the amount of forage production in the pollarding process and the description of traditional pattern of pollarding in Galajars (number and pollarded area of store trees) are the objectives of this research. This study was conducted in the two selected pollarded stands (Galajars). Data were collected from the selected stands in two stages. First, before pollarding (in August 2016), the locations and boundaries of the stands and their sections were separately determined using a GPS device. An inventory of all trees (DBH ≥ 5 cm) was conducted in the section to be pollarded (i.e. the khert section) in each stand: dbh, total and trunk heights and crown diameters in two perpendicular directions were measured and all trees were numbered. In the second stage of data collection (early September 2016), at the time of pollarding by local foresters, dbh, total and trunk heights, and crown diameters in two perpendicular directions were measured again and the total number of harvested foliage stacks and pollarded trees were counted and 10% of the foliage stacks of each pollarded tree were randomly selected and weighed using a digital scale (10 g accuracy). The positions of each store tree and all pollarded trees whose foliage stacks were stored on each store tree were recorded using GPS. Horizontal distance of trees belonging to the nearest store tree was measured. Results indicated that in pollarding process, the most changes occurred in crown area index. The weight of foliage stacks accumulated on each store tree and maximum transport distance of foliage stack to store tree in fist stand were 460.0 kg and 28 m, respectively, while for second stand, these indices were 463.6 kg and 41.5 m, respectively.
