Wildland fire limits subsequent fire occurrence

Several aspects of wildland fire are moderated by site- and landscape-level vegetation changes caused by previous fire, thereby creating a dynamic where one fire exerts a regulatory control on subsequent fire. For example, wildland fire has been shown to regulate the size and severity of subsequent...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:International journal of wildland fire Vol. 25; no. 2; pp. 182 - 190
Main Authors: Parks, Sean A, Miller, Carol, Holsinger, Lisa M, Baggett, L. Scott, Bird, Benjamin J
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: Roslyn CSIRO Publishing 01.01.2016
CSIRO
Subjects:
Biomass
Feedback
Forests
Leopold, Aldo (1886-1948)
longevity
Mountains
National parks
Parks & recreation areas
Regulation
Rocky Mountain region
Southwestern United States
Survival analysis
Topography
Vegetation
Vegetation changes
Wilderness
Wilderness areas
Wildfires
Rocky Mountain region
Southwestern United States
United States > US
Montana
Idaho
North America, Rocky Mts
USA
ISSN:1049-8001, 1448-5516
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Several aspects of wildland fire are moderated by site- and landscape-level vegetation changes caused by previous fire, thereby creating a dynamic where one fire exerts a regulatory control on subsequent fire. For example, wildland fire has been shown to regulate the size and severity of subsequent fire. However, wildland fire has the potential to influence other properties of subsequent fire. One of those properties – the extent to which a previous wildland fire inhibits new fires from igniting and spreading within its perimeter – is the focus of our study. In four large wilderness study areas in the western United States (US), we evaluated whether or not wildland fire regulated the ignition and spread (hereafter occurrence) of subsequent fire. Results clearly indicate that wildland fire indeed regulates subsequent occurrence of fires≥20ha in all study areas. We also evaluated the longevity of the regulating effect and found that wildland fire limits subsequent fire occurrence for nine years in the warm/dry study area in the south-western US and over 20 years in the cooler/wetter study areas in the northern Rocky Mountains. Our findings expand upon our understanding of the regulating capacity of wildland fire and the importance of wildland fire in creating and maintaining resilience to future fire events.
Bibliography:http://dx.doi.org/10.1071/WF15107
ObjectType-Article-1
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-2
content type line 14
content type line 23
ISSN:1049-8001
1448-5516
DOI:10.1071/WF15107