Abstract:In recent years, people have experienced great disasters which result fromdisruption of forests. Close attention is paid increasingly to hydrological function of theforests. In this paper, a brief history of researches in this field and the prospects concernedare reviewed. There are two periods in the researches: forest influence and forest-ecosystemhydrology. The effects of forests on rainfall, regulation of hydrological process, hydrologyof soil water and underground water, and ecological benefits of forest hydrology are presented. The author suggests that three aspects need to be emphasized．viz，the coupling research on forest pattern， and hydrological scale and process； research on regional characteristics；and the structure of water inflow and outlet in forest ecosystem．