C. Miller et Dl. Urban, Interactions between forest heterogeneity and surface fire regimes in the southern Sierra Nevada, CAN J FORES, 29(2), 1999, pp. 202-212
Citations number
58
Categorie Soggetti
Plant Sciences
Journal title
CANADIAN JOURNAL OF FOREST RESEARCH-REVUE CANADIENNE DE RECHERCHE FORESTIERE
Fire is a major agent of spatial pattern formation in forests, as it create
s a mosaic of burned and unburned patches. While most research has focused
on landscape-level patterns created by crown fires, millions of hectares of
forests in North America are subject to surface fire regimes. A spatially
explicit forest gap model developed for the Sierra Nevada was used to evalu
ate the influence of surface fire regimes on the heterogeneity of forest st
ructure and composition within forest stands. Forest pattern was evaluated
for a wide range of topographic positions in Sequoia National Park, Califor
nia, to determine if repeated surface fires amplify existing spatial patter
ns. The spatial heterogeneity of some forest characteristics increased unde
r a simulated fire regime relative to scenarios without fire. Although a di
stinct and regular fire-generated spatial pattern was not detected with an
analysis of spatial autocorrelation, simulated surface fires did alter the
spatial heterogeneity within a forest stand, primarily by degrading a regul
ar structure that is imposed by competition for light in the absence of fir
e. The interaction between surface fires and forest pattern may be qualitat
ively different from that which occurs in forests subject to crown fires. A
s such, what has been learned about forests dominated by crown fires may no
t apply to forests subject to surface fire regimes.