It has since been acknowledged that a wide range of plant and animal species depend on dead or dying wood for habitat (e.g. European otter) or as a food source (e.g. beetles). For example, in the United Kingdom up to a fifth of woodland species depend on dead or dying wood for all or part of their life cycle (Humphrey and Bailey, 2012). The amount of deadwood in forests is now increasingly used as a key international indicator of forest ecosystem biodiversity. With 5.7 m3/ha of standing and lying deadwood, Poland ranks fourth lowest among the 20 EU countries for which data are available (Forest Europe, UNECE, FAO 2013).