World Applied Sciences Journal 29 (3): 421-425, 2014 ISSN 1818-4952 © IDOSI Publications, 2014 DOI: 10.5829/idosi.wasj.2014.29.03.1571 Corresponding Author: Armin Mashayekhan, Phd Candidate of Forestry. Sari Agriculture and Natural Resources. Tel:09157664846. 421 Recreation Carrying Capacity Estimations to Support Forest Park Management (Case Study: Telar Forest Park, Ghaemshahr, Iran) Armin Mashayekhan, Marzie Mohamadi Calichi, 1 1 G.H. Rassam, Vahid Hoseini, Hamid Jalilvand 2 3 1 and Seyed Mostafa Moslemi Seyed Mohalleh 1 Sari Agriculture and Natural Resources, Iran 1 Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Shirvan College of Agriculture 2 Faculty of Natural Resources, Ferdosi University, Iran 3 Submitted: Dec 19, 2013; Accepted: Jan 12, 2014; Published: Jan 15, 2014 Abstract: Expanding recreational use of forest parks can strongly effect on natural resources and the quality of visitor experience. Deciding how much recreational use can extremely be adjusted in a park is stated by the concept of Carrying Capacity. Evaluation of Carrying Capacity as a management tool for forest park management in the North of Iran was presented in this study. Four factor including tourist flows, the size of the area, the optimum space available for each tourist and the visiting time were employed for evaluating physical Carrying Capacity. Results showed that the physical carrying capacity should be 54.8 ha 320visitors/day and real carrying capacity should be 31.6 ha 177 visitors/day. When total visitors to the park in 2012 were 220 visitors per day that actual average park visitation are higher than the estimated Carrying Capacity. The expanding recreational use would also unfriendly affect production and other forest benefits in long term. Therefore this study suggests that a recreational forest use plan must be adjusted by the planner to keep the park from heavy use and also optimum number of people without an unacceptable change in physical environment (Carrying Capacity) can be applied for ecosystem management, keeping of the high quality and quantitative of forest park and securing the ecological benefits stable for future. Key words: Recreation Forest park management Carrying Capacity Telar Ghaemshahr Iran INTRODUCTION of maximum population from of an individual species Forest parks are resources of national and ecosystem Lee et al. [7]. Munar [2] suggest that the international significance that contains great importance Carrying Capacity provides the optimum level on which to the nation community. The Telar forest park now resources can damage to the ecosystems are irreversible, adapts nearly 80000 visits annually. One of the most providing a mathematical formula of how many tourists threats to forest parks is crowded and this decreases are enough. Mexa and Coccossis [8] showed that from the quality of experience. Also, natural resources Carrying Capacity assessment remains a powerful concept could be degraded by extreme visitor use. In more formal that can be used for planning and management of conditions, utilize of around forest parks have exceeded sustainable tourism. Many studies calculated Carrying their Carrying Capacity [1-6]. Carrying Capacity was first Capacity using physical, ecological, psychological and suggested in the 1930s as a park management concept in economical approach [9,10]. Because of expanding of the context of national parks [5], even if systematic degree of environmental treat with growing tourism, application did not happen until the 1960s. The initial sustainable method need to carry out and Carrying focus was on ecological issues and it came from Capacity stay one of the applied and affective population growth theory by ecologists as an upper limit method Zacarias et al. [11]. Later, social view of which can be kept without any unacceptable change of