A clear-cutting of canopy trees during winter often causes severe foliar damage during the following spring in forest floor seedlings of Abies sachalinensis, a typical shade-tolerant evergreen coniferous species. We investigated chronic photoinhibition around spring budbreak in 1-year-old shoots of seedlings of A. sachalinensis grown under full sunlight in a nursery. We also investigated chronic photoinhibition in the field immediately before budbreak in 1-year-old shoots of shade-acclimated seedlings of A. sachalinensis and growth of current-year shoots following winter cutting of canopy trees with various cutting rates. The maximum photochemical efficiency of photosystem II after an overnight dark adaptation showed a momentary decrease immediately before budbreak in 1-year-old shoots of the seedlings of A. sachalinensis grown in the nursery, suggesting an increased susceptibility to photoinhibition. Following the winter cuttings of canopy trees, greater extents of photoinhibition were observed immediately before budbreak in 1-year-old shoots of seedlings of A. sachalinensis with a greater amount of insolation in the morning, and a recovery from the photoinhibition was observed in summertime. Growth of current-year shoots decreased with increasing amount of insolation estimated for springtime, suggesting that photoinhibitory damage on the pre-existing shoots in springtime resulted in suppressed growth of current-year shoots.