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Arasbaran forests located in East Azarbayjan (North-West of Iran). Socio-economical problems of villagers cause increasingly destruction on exclusive biodiversity of these forests. A basic approach for preserving this forest is public cooperation in agroforestry activities for nonwood production using multipurpose trees such as cornelian cherry (Cornus mas L.). This species grows naturally in Arasbaran forests and a plenty amount of its fruit have annually been exploited in traditional manner. This study aims to assess the ecological requirement of cornelian cherry and the important factors which affect on distribution of this species. For this purpose, 40 circular samples, each 300 m2 were selected in different aspects regarding to occurrence of Cornus mas in mature stands. Results showed that DBH and crown cover means in the north aspect were significantly more than those of other aspects and the proportion of cornelian cherry in mature stands counted for 4.5% of individuals recorded in the sample. North facing aspects have more seed-origin trees of cornelian cherry than coppice ones; on the contrary west facing aspects had more coppice trees. Regeneration of this species has the highest individuals in the sapling stage with 0-2.5 cm DBH. The mean number of total regeneration (including all species) per sample was 117.1 individuals in the Cornus mas sites.