A Comprehensive Evaluation Of Heritage Trees

China had a long history, splendid culture and a large number of heritage trees (HTs). They were perfect combinations of the natural and social attributes and rich of embedded and extended value.The researches on HTs evaluation systems were few and still in the exploratory stage, in China. The existing evaluation methods also had some defects currently.Based on the comprehensive study of HTs value, we chose analytic hierarchy process (AHP) to establish the HTs evaluation system in this research, combined with related researches and evaluation methods at home and abroad. According to received expert questionnaires we constructed relative judge matrixes, through calculating and testing Radom Index (RI).At last we got the weights of indicators in all layers. Combining with indicator scores and basic values of HTs, we proposed the quantitative evaluation methods and monetary evaluation methods for HTs evaluation. There was no paper about HTs evaluation using AHP method before. This was an innovation point.The results showed the weights of eight indicators in index layers as follows: History(0.4529)> Aesthetics and ethic(0.1326)> Species diversity(0.1204)> Biomass (0.0919)> Tradition-custom and literature-art (0.0776)> Growth quality(0.0663)> Wood products(0.0520)> Forest products(0.0065). The History indicator occupied a high proportion in the total weight, reflected the core value of HTs. It was also in line with most people's understanding of HTs. Wood products indicator and forest products indicator which reflecting the economic value occupied the lowest proportion in the total weight. It showed these two indicator had low correlation with HTs comprehensive value.In order to test the evaluation system. In this research we chose two HTs in Nanjing and one in Beijing for analysis. They were one Pterocarya stenoptera C. DC. in Nanjing normal university, one Sabina chinensis in Southeast University, one Sabina chinensis in Temple of Heaven in Beijing. The respective quantitative evaluation results were 41.96,66.884,76.142. The respective monetary evaluation results were:0.8498Million yuan,2.1869Million yuan,5.1021 Million yuan. These results reflected the comprehensive value of HTs,had discrimination and practicality in a certain degree, at the same time. This research could provide a reference for future researches.