Fire interval effects on persistence of resprouter species in Mediterranean-type shrublands

Enright, Neal J.; Fontaine, Joseph B.; Westcott, Vanessa C.; Lade, Jennifer A.; Miller, Ben P.

doi:10.1007/s11258-011-9970-7

Cited by 71 publications

(53 citation statements)

References 37 publications

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“…Many shrubs in CSS and other mediterranean-climate shrublands crown-sprout following fire, and they may be especially vulnerable during this sprouting period, as high gas exchange rates are needed to rebuild tissue (Desouza et al 1986, Enright et al 2011. Our results indicate both increased mortality and reduced growth of crown-sprouting individuals in the water reduction treatments.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 68%

Altered water and nitrogen input shifts succession in a southern California coastal sage community

Kimball

Goulden

Suding

et al. 2014

Ecological Applications

144

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Vegetation‐type conversions between grasslands and shrublands have occurred worldwide in semiarid regions over the last 150 years. Areas once covered by drought‐deciduous shrubs in Southern California (coastal sage scrub) are converting to grasslands dominated by nonnative species. Increasing fire frequency, drought, and nitrogen deposition have all been hypothesized as causes of this conversion, though there is little direct evidence. We constructed rain‐out shelters in a coastal sage scrub community following a wildfire, manipulated water and nitrogen input in a split‐plot design, and collected annual data on community composition for four years. While shrub cover increased through time in all plots during the postfire succession, both drought and nitrogen significantly slowed recovery. Four years after the fire, average native shrub cover ranged from over 80% in water addition, ambient‐nitrogen plots to 20% in water reduction, nitrogen addition plots. Nonnative grass cover was high following the fire and remained high in the water reduction plots through the third spring after the fire, before decreasing in the fourth year of the study. Adding nitrogen decreased the cover of native plants and increased the cover of nonnative grasses, but also increased the growth of one crown‐sprouting shrub species. Our results suggest that extreme drought during postfire succession may slow or alter succession, possibly facilitating vegetation‐type conversion of coastal sage scrub to grassland. Nitrogen addition slowed succession and, when combined with drought, significantly decreased native cover and increased grass cover. Fire, drought, and atmospheric N deposition are widespread aspects of environmental change that occur simultaneously in this system. Our results imply these drivers of change may reinforce each other, leading to a continued decline of native shrubs and conversion to annual grassland.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 68%

Altered water and nitrogen input shifts succession in a southern California coastal sage community

Kimball

Goulden

Suding

et al. 2014

Ecological Applications

144

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…Short-interval fires, and/ or frequent pruning to simulate the effect of fire, can lead to premature death (Grano 1970;Zammit and Westoby 1987;Watson and Wardell-Johnson 2004;Wright and Clarke 2007a;Enright et al 2011). However, Wright and Clarke (2007a) report a rare instance, in central Australian spinifex-mulga vegetation, where a 2-year-interval fire resulted in an increase in resprouter abundance compared with longer intervals.…”

Section: Vegetative Recovery and Fitness Benefitsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fitness and evolution of resprouters in relation to fire

Lamont

Enright

2011

Plant Ecol

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There are many ways that plants may recover vegetatively from dieback caused by fires. Compared with fire-killed species, the presence of woody resprouters in fire-prone floras increases with fire frequency, though this is affected by site productivity that may have opposing correlates along different gradients. Population recovery is enhanced by resprouting when fecundity is low and/or seedling recruitment is not guaranteed. There is resource cycling between vegetative growth and storage but no clear trade-off between fecundity and storage, and more attention needs to be given to the role of somatic mutations in reducing fecundity. Seven fitness benefits of post-fire resprouting are noted that centre around the rapid return to adult growth rates and early flowering and seed set without the risks of recruitment failure. The extent of resprouting at the individual, population, and species levels varies greatly but it is under genetic control. Recent studies on the evolution of resprouting in fire-prone systems have shown that types of resprouting (clonality, rootstocks, epicormic bud strands) are derived from surrounding parent lineages lacking these traits and confined to nonfire-prone environments. The oldest lineages with firerelated resprouting date to at least 61 million years ago, indicating that seed plants have had a long evolutionary relationship with fire. Various genetic mechanisms, including beneficial somatic mutations, have been invoked to explain how speciation of resprouters may keep pace with non-sprouters.

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“…Fire frequency could, conditionally, specify the dominant resprouter species in a plant community (Enright, Fontaine, Westcott, Lade, & Miller, 2011;Kruger, Midgley, & Cowling, 1997).…”

Section: Fire Frequency and Fire Return Intervalmentioning

confidence: 99%

Maps of fire occurrence – spatially explicit reconstruction of recent fire history using satellite remote sensing

et al. 2012

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Maps depicting the spatially explicit fire history of an area, including variables such as fire frequency and fire return interval, are important tools promoting the understanding of processes associated with wildfires (fire ignition and spread), the assessment of the impacts of wildland fires on landscape dynamics, and decisions on appropriate management practices. Remote sensing is a cost-and time-effective alternative to automatically assess a vast amount of spatial information and produce various thematic maps. The aim of this study was to reconstruct the recent fire history of Attica region (Greece), in a spatially explicit mode by means of remote sensing techniques using a series of Landsat images acquired from 1984 to 2011. The results show that the fire scar perimeters were captured with high accuracy. Regression modelling shows that the differences between the area burned estimated from satellite data and that recorded by the forest service can be explained (86.3% of the variance) by the number of satellite images used (standardized coefficient 0.752) followed by the date of the first image (standardized coefficient 0.705). The use of satellite data as the basic source of information alongside automated classification methods should be promoted for the creation of fire history maps. The latter is further supported when considering the long history of data capture from Landsat satellites, which provide a huge, global historical archive of repeat images of the Earth's surface.

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Fire interval effects on persistence of resprouter species in Mediterranean-type shrublands

Cited by 71 publications

References 37 publications

Altered water and nitrogen input shifts succession in a southern California coastal sage community

Altered water and nitrogen input shifts succession in a southern California coastal sage community

Fitness and evolution of resprouters in relation to fire

Maps of fire occurrence – spatially explicit reconstruction of recent fire history using satellite remote sensing

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