DOI: 10.1016/j.foreco.2015.05.040
Scopus记录号: 2-s2.0-84937978954
论文题名: Increasing weight of evidence that thinning and burning treatments help restore understory plant communities in ponderosa pine forests
作者: Strahan R.T. ; Stoddard M.T. ; Springer J.D. ; Huffman D.W.
刊名: Forest Ecology and Management
ISSN: 0378-1127
出版年: 2015
卷: 353 起始页码: 208
结束页码: 220
语种: 英语
英文关键词: Natural range of variability
; Ponderosa pine
; Prescribed fire
; Restoration
; Understory response
; Woody plant encroachment
Scopus关键词: Climate change
; Complex networks
; Ecology
; Environmental management
; Fires
; Health risks
; Image reconstruction
; Land use
; Restoration
; Natural range of variability
; Ponderosa pines
; Prescribed fires
; Understory response
; Woody-plant encroachments
; Forestry
; coniferous forest
; disease severity
; dominance
; forest fire
; forest management
; insect
; land use change
; plant community
; prescribed burning
; restoration ecology
; species richness
; thinning
; understory
; woody plant
; North America
; Hexapoda
英文摘要: For more than a century ecosystems around the world have experienced an increase in the dominance of woody species. While the drivers of woody plant proliferation are complex, interactions between climate and land-use change are commonly invoked as primary contributing factors. In ponderosa pine forests of western North America, substantial increases in tree densities are impacting overall forest health and increasing the risk for severe wildfires and insect and disease outbreaks. Addressing this problem through the use of ecological restoration projects is widely advocated. Our objective was to quantify understory vegetation response five years after thinning and burning treatments in a southwestern ponderosa pine forest. We remeasured plant species richness and cover on thinned + burned, burned only, and untreated controls replicated four time in a BACI design. An untreated control (Untreated) was used for comparison of two alternative restoration treatments (1) thinning followed by prescribed fire (Thin + Burn) and (2) prescribed fire only (Burn-only). Understory species richness and total plant cover increased significantly in Thin + Burn compared to the Untreated and Burn-only treatments. Analysis of functional group composition revealed increases in species richness and cover was driven primarily by changes in annual-biennial forbs and graminoids. We then compared our results with those of three Long-term Ecological Restoration and Assessment Network (LEARN) sites. We found total and native plant cover showed evidence of a consistent response to Thin + Burn treatments across all sites. However, results suggest that understory response to restoration treatments is under strong environmental control. As a consequence the range of variability associated with understory responses should be expected to expand or contract depending on where treatments are implemented. Overall our findings add to a growing body of literature that restoration treatments combining mechanical thinning and prescribed fire are useful for increasing native understory abundance and diversity. © 2015 Elsevier B.V. Citation statistics:
资源类型: 期刊论文
标识符: http://119.78.100.158/handle/2HF3EXSE/65348
Appears in Collections: 影响、适应和脆弱性
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作者单位: Ecological Restoration Institute, Northern Arizona University, P.O. Box 15017, Flagstaff, AZ, United States
Recommended Citation:
Strahan R.T.,Stoddard M.T.,Springer J.D.,et al. Increasing weight of evidence that thinning and burning treatments help restore understory plant communities in ponderosa pine forests[J]. Forest Ecology and Management,2015-01-01,353