Understanding natural forest dynamics is a crucial to derive near-natural management strategies. In this context, reference areas that display forest dynamics under a natural disturbance regime play a prominent role. Based on three examples from reference areas of the municipal forest Lübeck, Germany we introduce options for implementing aspects of nature conservation in managed forests. Analyses of competition response of European beech (Fagus sylvatica ) indicated that thinning treatments in beech forests can be drastically reduced. For larger beech trees (DBH > 40 cm), periods of non-forestry use of 50 years until harvest are feasible. Combined with long rotation periods, an alignment of biomass pools typical for unmanaged forests is possible. This would be a further step towards enhanced ecological continuity in managed forests. Analyses of gap structures showed that the amount and size of canopy gaps in deciduous forests greatly vary with soil water content and tree species. In contrast to beech forests with canopy gaps mainly smaller than 200 m², gaps of 400 to 1000 m² are not uncommon for moist forest communities. Species richness of lignicolous fungi is closely correlated with anagement intensity and strongly increases with increasing duration of natural forest development. For the first time we present dead-wood threshold values for macro-fungi indicator species in lowland beech forests. Our critical threshold levels range from 19 m3 ha-1 (coarse wood debris, > 15 cm) to 25 m3 ha-1 (dead wood > 7 cm) and are considerably lower than those reported for naturalness indicators in colline-submontane beech forests. Densely stocked stands with a high percentage (> 75 %) of coarse woody debris and strongly decayed (decay stage 3-4) dead wood are ideal to conserve fungal diversity. Moreover, common hornbeam ( Carpinus betulus) provides an important contribution to increase the diversity of fungi and epiphytic lichens in beech forests.