In recent years, efforts to re-evaluate the value of forest spaces, such as in terms of the forest-related service industry and forest-style, have been attracting attention. However, as many as half of all urban residents have not entered a forest in a year. As such, it will be beneficial to develop an understanding of people’s perceptions regarding the concept of a forest to investigate how to promote forest spaces and increase awareness of them. Meanwhile, in recent years, studies of green spaces, such as parks and forests, have been conducted with data from social media. These data enable an objective understanding of people’s conceptions concerning forests and their use. To investigate this, we set May 2021, the second year of the coronavirus pandemic, as the study period. During this period, people’s desire for nature and forests increased. This study analyzed social media data to elucidate the characteristics of users’ utilization and perception of forests. The results demonstrated that users visited parks to let their children play and forests mainly for the healing effects associated with forest bathing; it was further observed that users of parks and forests often view flowers and take photographs in such green spaces. It was also made clear that social media users typically refer to forests as conceptual objects without referring to physical experiences. To promote further use of forest spaces, it would be effective to introduce interpreters who would be capable of stimulating the senses and translating experiences into awareness.

A commercially available nozzle-type insecticide was applied to kill the ambrosia beetle, Platypus quercivorus, boring into the trunks of living trees. The insecticide was injected using the nozzle attached to the commercial product into the holes created by P. quercivorus adults on the trunks of several Fagaceae tree species and frass ejection from the holes was observed weekly for 4 to 6 weeks post-injection. We also tested two types of holes created at different times. Regardless of the tree species or hole types, frass ejection rates in the final observations of the respective experiments were remarkably low (0–10%) in the treated holes, whereas the untreated holes showed high ejection rates (25–89%). Therefore, we concluded that the control method using the nozzle-type insecticide is highly effective in killing P. quercivorus dwelling in tree trunks.

Solar radiation under forest canopies were observed for 4 – 9 years in 9 observation plots in 3 forests of cedar and cypress with basal areas at breast height less than 46 m²ha^-1. 59 ratios of relative solar radiation calculated using these observed values will be published as research record along with values of basal area at breast or forest floor height. The difference of relative solar radiation ratios is not recognized clearly between the forests with increasing basal areas from new planted to young and closed canopy forests, and decreasing basal areas forests caused by thinning.

Little information is available on how (+)-catechin is decomposed by soil bacteria. Paraburkholderia oxyphila OX-01 was previously isolated as a (+)-catechin catabolizing agent. This study succeeded in isolating many P. oxyphila OX-01 mutants defective in catabolizing (+)-catechin by a single insertion of the transposon miniTn5km1 in the genome. Aromatics utilization, (+)-catechin decomposing profiles, and mini-Tn5km1 insertion sites were variable among mutants. Nucleotide sequencing of insertion sites in representative mutants revealed that mutants that could not utilize all aromatics tested but decompose (+)-catechin to some extent had the insertion in tricarboxylic acid cycle-related genes, whereas those that only could not utilize (+)-catechin and (+)-taxifolin so far had the insertion in transporter-related genes. The P. oxyphila OX-01 gene library constructed in the pLAFER5 cosmid restored the wild-type phenotype in mutants. Mini-Tn5km1 insertion mutagenesis is useful in isolating various P. oxyphila mutants that can be subjected to complementation analysis with the pLAFR5-based gene library.

The Tama Forest Science Garden, part of the Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute in Hachioji City, Tokyo, is a suburban forest of approximately 56 hectares located southwest of Tokyo, Japan. To date, 784 taxa of vascular plants have been confirmed in the Tama Forest Science Garden, and we have identified and classified 12 additional taxa. The plants found include species designated by the metropolitan government in Red Data Book Tokyo 2023 as important wildlife species to be protected, along with others that have recently expanded their distribution within the city or nationwide, providing a valuable resource for managing and monitoring the vegetation of the Tama Forest Science Garden.