The level of biodiversity is in decline, also in forests. As more natural structures are known to safeguard biodiversity, changes in forest management, including higher amounts of deadwood, may help reverse the decline. However, this could lead to trade-offs between forest ecosystem services, and forest recreation might be negatively affected by the presence of more natural forest structures, especially deadwood. So far, only a few studies have investigated the influence of deadwood on recreation in larger forest areas and on a national or regional scale. To better understand the possible impact, we analysed how higher amounts and different forms of deadwood would affect site preferences for recreation employing an online survey based on a representative sample in Bavaria, Germany (N = 1462). A choice experiment comprising different forest alternatives with varying degrees of deadwood showed that the amount of deadwood does not influence respondents' choice of recreation sites. However, deadwood quality attributes, i.e. structural variety and advanced decomposition positively impacted site choices. Latent class models revealed both observed and unobserved taste heterogeneity. Deadwood was, however, not an essential attribute for the forest site-selection, while infrastructure facilities or good paths/accessibility were more important. The results show that no significant trade-offs between forest recreation and deadwood enrichment exist. At the same time, respondents showed solid preferences for improving habitats for rare and endangered species in forests, indicating that biodiversity is significant to them. As the preferences for a mixture of standing and lying structures also coincide with conservation ecology research, we conclude that conflicts between recreationists and increased occurrence of deadwood to promote biodiversity are not that severe as often assumed by forest managers.

生物多样性的水平正在下降，森林也是如此。随着越来越多的自然结构被称为保护生物多样性，森林管理的变化，包括更多的枯木，可能有助于扭转下降趋势。然而，这可能会导致森林生态系统服务之间的权衡，森林娱乐可能会受到更多天然森林结构，尤其是枯木的存在的负面影响。到目前为止，只有少数研究调查了枯木对较大林区以及国家或区域范围内的娱乐活动的影响。为了更好地了解可能产生的影响，我们通过基于德国巴伐利亚州代表性样本的在线调查分析了较高数量和不同形式的枯木如何影响场地对娱乐的偏好（N = 1462）。一个包括不同森林替代品和不同程度枯木的​​选择实验表明，枯木的数量不会影响受访者对休闲场所的选择。然而，枯木质量属性，即结构多样性和高级分解对场地选择产生了积极影响。潜在类别模型揭示了观察到的和未观察到的味道异质性。然而，枯木并不是森林选址的基本属性，而基础设施或良好的路径/可达性更为重要。结果表明，在森林娱乐和枯木丰富之间不存在显着的权衡。与此同时，受访者对改善森林中稀有和濒危物种的栖息地表现出强烈的偏好，表明生物多样性对他们来说意义重大。