Fire History of a Temperate Forest with an Endemic Fire-Dependent Herb

Abstract

A dendroecological fire history study was conducted for The Nature Conservancy's Narrows Preserve on Peters Mountain, Virginia, where the predominant vegetation is oak (Quercus L.)-dominated forest containing some other hardwoods and pines (Pinus L.). The site encompasses all the known habitat of the endangered and endemic Peters Mountain mallow (Iliamna corei Sherff.), a perennial herb that requires fire for seed germination and habitat maintenance. Fire scars from 73 pines indicate frequent burning in the past (Weibull median composite fire interval = 2.2 years), primarily during the dormant season. Fire frequency exhibited little temporal variability from the beginning of the fire chronology in 1794 until the 1940s, despite changing land uses. However, the incidence of fire declined subsequently with the advent of effective fire protection measures. Ageing trees near the mallow population indicates that the fire-tolerant chestnut oak (Quercus montana Willd.) recruited relatively continuously under frequent fire, but that other species were established primarily during the fire protection era. The decline in burning appears to have permitted an increase in tree density that likely inhibits the growth and recruitment of mallow plants. Our results suggest that reintroducing frequent fire would be an appropriate technique for managing the mallows and the greater Peters Mountain landscape. [

Mesophication in temperate Europe: A dendrochronological reconstruction of tree succession and fires in a mixed deciduous stand in Białowieża Forest

“…Our results reflect data reported from temperate forests of Eastern North America, where several species of oaks and pines established and maintained their populations under frequent fire disturbance over centuries (e.g., Hoss, Lafon, Grissino-Mayer, Aldrich, & DeWeese, 2008.;Flatley et al, 2015; recently summarized by Lafon et al, 2017), profiting from open stand conditions shaped by surface fires (Nowacki & Abrams, 2008), while fire-sensitive tree species which were likely to be regenerating as well could not survive due to the short fire intervals (Lafon et al, 2017 and references therein). This pattern, with fire acting as a filter in shaping species composition (McEwan et al, 2014), has been proven to be a landscape-scale process, acting throughout a gradient of habitat types: from xeric to mesic sites (Flatley et al, 2015).…”

Yellow pine regeneration as a function of fire severity and post-burn stand structure in the southern Appalachian Mountains

“…Most fires of the late 19th and early 20th century burned during the dormant seasons with burns occurring in the spring and, with less frequency, the fall (Harmon, 1981;Lafon et al, 2005;Hoss et al, 2008). Trees within pine stands that have been sampled in the central and southern Appalachians mostly originated during the late 1800s and early 1900s under this regime (Sutherland et al, 1995;Armbrister, 2002;Brose and Waldrop, 2006;Aldrich et al, 2010).…”

Fire intensity effects on seed germination of native and invasive Eastern deciduous forest understory plants

“…Native and nonnative species may have different responses to fire intensity. For example, while a few understory species native to EDF rely on low-intensity fire for germination (e.g., Hoss et al, 2008), highintensity prescribed fires can stimulate germination of non-native understory species such as Rosa multiflora (Glasgow and Matlack, 2007a).…”