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One of the essential tasks of sustainable forest management is to maintain native biodiversity. Primary forest research is one of the ways to understand what this biodiversity is. Matherials and methods. The primary, as confirmed by their land-use history and structural peculiarities, mesic dark-conifer forests remain in Visim and Pechora–Ilych nature biosphere reserves (boreal and sub-boreal zones respectively, the Ural Mountains, Russian Federation). We compared the primary forests and post fire 100-year small-leaved deciduous forests by diversity of vascular flora and soil invertebrate macrofauna. Results and discussion. The diversity of some functional groups of species (low boreal herbs, earthworms) in post fire forests is lower than in primary forests, the research shows. These species largely depend on deadwood and other tree-related microhabitats common in the primary forests but not so in the 100-year post fire forests. Repeated fires at intervals of several decades, as is the case with the use of prescribed fires in forest management, will be expected to reduce the biodiversity quality of these specialist species. Additionally, we revealed that post fire forest flora is more synanthropic in the woodland of a small area (Visim reserve) than in the intact forest landscape (Pechora–Ilych reserve). It demonstrates that, within extensive woodlands, native forests are more resilient to sporadic stand-replacing disturbances than small woodlands. Conclusion. Strict conservation of intact forest landscapes is necessary as they serve as large buffer areas around the remaining primary forests to maintain native biodiversity.

Background. To reveal anthropogenic processes that were directly influencing formation of contemporary forest vegetation in forestry of the Zvenigorod Biologocal Station (ZBS, Moscow region), it is necessary to analyze the 19th century documents. Question of the research is to determine which kinds of land-use are reliably documented, and the general objective is to describe anthropogenic impact on formation of contemporary forests systematically. Materials and methods. Documents were searched in the Central State Archive of Moscow (CSAM). Additional information was extracted from published (1870–1899) reports of Forestry Department (Ministry of State Property). The data of forest inventory (1985–1986) were used to demonstrate the former land-use effects in structure of contemporary forests vegetation. Results. For the first half of the 19th century archive documents were found those reflect numerous commercial cuts and annual mowing in forests. In the second half of the 19th century, sizes of clear-cuttings and number of seed trees, leaved behind cuts, were set by state rules of cuts published in 1870; in the same rules, also plowing (and even grain agriculture for several years) on clear-cuttings was recommended to improve tree seed germination. The effects of such land-use ways were detected in spatial structure and tree-layer species composition of the contemporary forests. Documents on fire history or purposeful tree planting have not been found yet. Conclusion. It is documented that contemporary forests of the Zvenigorod Biological Station have been formed under impact of cuts and regular mowing. The reported experience of document search and the review of published state forestry standards can be useful for planning further studies on land-use history concerned with other European Russian regions under similar landscape and historical conditions.