scholarly journals Fire disturbance and climate change: implications for Russian forests

2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 035003 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacquelyn K Shuman ◽  
Adrianna C Foster ◽  
Herman H Shugart ◽  
Amanda Hoffman-Hall ◽  
Alexander Krylov ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Fire Disturbance ◽  
Russian Forests

Species adaptation to both fire and climate change in tropical montane heath: Can Melaleuca uxorum (Myrtaceae) survive?

2012 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 319 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew J Ford ◽  
Britta Denise Hardesty
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Soil Seed Bank ◽  
Seed Storage ◽  
Fire Disturbance ◽  
Cloud Base ◽  
Widespread Species ◽  
History Of ◽  
In Fire ◽  
Local Burning ◽  
Impacts Of Climate Change

Resprouting following fire is an effective and well utilized strategy for tropical montane heath species which have had a long evolutionary history of intermittent fire disturbance. Research conducted in both burnt and unburnt heath suggests that species richness is related to fire, however actual species presence is dependent upon local burning regimes. Taxa that persist in fire-adapted environments may survive through mechanisms including seed storage in the soil seed bank, resprouting from basal, axillary or epicormic buds, roots/rhizomes or terminal aerial buds and/or through migration of seed. We investigated the montane endemic Melaleuca uxorum’s response to fire to understand local adaptation and persistence to fire in fire prone heath and to understand potential impacts of climate change on montane heath ecosystems. We found that the species resprouts at the stem base, along stems from epicormic buds and from axillary buds. The species forms small colonies which appear to be a mixture of sexual and asexual (clonal) reproduction. We predict that the effects of climate change will conspire against tropical montane heath below 1000 m, and those communities away from maritime influences will be under threat of increasingly reduced population numbers and extent as the dry season cloud base is expected to rise in elevation with anticipated rising temperatures. Furthermore, as evaporation rates increase, such communities are anticipated to lose their local specialized flora and to be replaced by more common unspecialized, widespread species.

scholarly journals Russian forests and climate change

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Background Information ◽  
Changing Environment ◽  
Russian Forests

We live in an intricate and changing environment with interrelated feedback between ecosystems, society, economy and the environment. EFI’s ‘What Science Can Tell Us’ series is based on collective scientific expert reviews providing interdisciplinary background information on key and complex forest-related issues for policy and decision makers, citizens and society in general.

Dynamics of moisture content in spruce–feather moss and spruce–Sphagnum organic layers during an extreme fire season and implications for future depths of burn in Clay Belt black spruce forests

2014 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 490 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aurélie Terrier ◽  
William J. de Groot ◽  
Martin P. Girardin ◽  
Yves Bergeron
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Moisture Content ◽  
Mixed Model ◽  
Linear Mixed Model ◽  
Black Spruce ◽  
Weather Conditions ◽  
Fire Disturbance ◽  
Fire Season ◽  
Organic Layer ◽  
Feather Moss

High moisture levels and low frequency of wildfires have contributed to the accumulation of the organic layer in open black spruce (Picea mariana)–Sphagnum dominated stands of eastern boreal North America. The anticipated increase in drought frequency with climate change could lead to moisture losses and a transfer of the stored carbon back into the atmosphere due to increased fire disturbance and decomposition. Here we studied the dynamics of soil moisture content and weather conditions in spruce–feather moss and spruce–Sphagnum dominated stands of the boreal Clay Belt of eastern Canada during particularly dry conditions. A linear mixed model was developed to predict the moisture content of the organic material according to weather, depth and site conditions. This model was then used to calculate potential depth of burn and applied to climate model projections to determine the sensitivity of depth of burn to future fire hazards. Our results suggest that depth of burn varies only slightly in response to changes in weather conditions in spruce–Sphagnum stands. The reverse holds true in spruce–feather moss stands. In conclusion, our results suggest that spruce–Sphagnum stands in the boreal Clay Belt may be resistant to an increase in the depth of burn risk under climate change.

scholarly journals Mitigating the Effects of Climate Change through Harvesting and Planting in Boreal Forests of Northeastern China

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (10) ◽  
pp. 3531 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xu Luo ◽  
Hong He ◽  
Yu Liang ◽  
Jacob Fraser ◽  
Jialin Li
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Forest Management ◽  
Boreal Forests ◽  
Fire Regime ◽  
Landscape Scale ◽  
Fire Disturbance ◽  
Ecological Resilience ◽  
Reference Scenario ◽  
Fire Occurrence ◽  
Management Scenario

The ecological resilience of boreal forests is an important element of measuring forest ecosystem capacity recovered from a disturbance, and is sensitive to broad-scale factors (e.g., climate change, fire disturbance and human related impacts). Therefore, quantifying the effects of these factors is increasingly important for forest ecosystem management. In this study, we investigated the impacts of climate change, climate-induced fire regimes, and forest management schemes on forest ecological resilience using a forest landscape model in the boreal forests of the Great Xing’an Mountains, Northeastern China. First, we simulated the effects of the three studied variables on forest aboveground biomass, growing space occupied, age cohort structure, and the proportion of mid and late-seral species indicators by using the LANDIS PRO model. Second, we calculated ecological resilience based on these four selected indicators. We designed five simulated scenarios: Current fire only scenario, increased fire occurrence only scenario, climate change only scenario, climate-induced fire regime scenario, and climate-fire-management scenario. We analyzed ecological resilience over the five scenarios from 2000 to 2300. The results indicated that the initialized stand density and basal area information from the year 2000 adequately represented the real forest landscape of that year, and no significant difference was found between the simulated landscape of year 2010 and the forest inventory data of that year at the landscape scale. The simulated fire disturbance results were consistent with field inventory data in burned areas. Compared to the current fire regime scenario, forests where fire occurrence increased by 30% had an increase in ecological resilience of 12.4–43.2% at the landscape scale, whereas increasing fire occurrence by 200% would decrease the ecological resilience by 2.5–34.3% in all simulated periods. Under the low climate-induced fire regime scenario, the ecological resilience was 12.3–26.7% higher than that in the reference scenario across all simulated periods. Under the high climate-induced fire regime scenario, the ecological resilience decreased significantly by 30.3% and 53.1% in the short- and medium-terms at landscape scale, while increasing slightly by 3.8% in the long-term period compared to the reference scenario. Compared to no forest management scenario, ecological resilience was decreased by 5.8–32.4% under all harvesting and planting strategies for the low climate-induced fire regime scenario, and only the medium and high planting intensity scenarios visibly increased the ecological resilience (1.7–15.8%) under the high climate-induced fire regime scenario at the landscape scale. Results from our research provided insight into the future forest management and have implications for improving boreal forest sustainability.

Fungal community structure and seasonal trajectories respond similarly to fire across pyrophilic ecosystems

2020 ◽  
Vol 97 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacob R Hopkins ◽  
Tatiana Semenova-Nelsen ◽  
Benjamin A Sikes
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Community Structure ◽  
Tallgrass Prairie ◽  
Fungal Community ◽  
Community Dynamics ◽  
Microbial Community Composition ◽  
Soil Nutrient ◽  
Fire Disturbance ◽  
Fungal Communities ◽  
Fungal Community Structure

ABSTRACT Fire alters microbial community composition, and is expected to increase in frequency due to climate change. Testing whether microbes in different ecosystems will respond similarly to increased fire disturbance is difficult though, because fires are often unpredictable and hard to manage. Fire recurrent or pyrophilic ecosystems, however, may be useful models for testing the effects of frequent disturbance on microbes. We hypothesized that across pyrophilic ecosystems, fire would drive similar alterations to fungal communities, including altering seasonal community dynamics. We tested fire's effects on fungal communities in two pyrophilic ecosystems, a longleaf pine savanna and tallgrass prairie. Fire caused similar fungal community shifts, including (i) driving immediate changes that favored taxa able to survive fire and take advantage of post-fire environments and (ii) altering seasonal trajectories due to fire-associated changes to soil nutrient availability. This suggests that fire has predictable effects on fungal community structure and intra-annual community dynamics in pyrophilic ecosystems, and that these changes could significantly alter fungal function. Parallel fire responses in these key microbes may also suggest that recurrent fires drive convergent changes across ecosystems, including less fire-frequented systems that may start burning more often due to climate change.

Fire disturbance during climate change: failure of postfire forest recovery on a boreal floodplain

2004 ◽  
Vol 34 (11) ◽  
pp. 2294-2305 ◽  
Author(s):  
Élodie Bouchon ◽  
Dominique Arseneault
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Black Spruce ◽  
Abies Balsamea ◽  
Fire Disturbance ◽  
Forest Recovery ◽  
Balsam Fir ◽  
Future Climate Change ◽  
Forest Site ◽  
Stream Channel ◽  
Order Stream

We used tree remains to document the failure of postfire forest recovery following a 1941 fire on a boreal floodplain along a third-order stream in northern Quebec. Two sites, one with postfire shrubs and the other an unburned forest, were studied. Tree remains on the floodplain and within the stream channel at the shrub site suggest the former presence of a forest stand similar to present-day vegetation at the forest site. At both sites, black spruce (Picea mariana (Mill.) BSP) has been the dominant tree species, whereas eastern larch (Larix laricina (Du Roi) K. Koch) and balsam fir (Abies balsamea (L.) Mill.) have made up only a small proportion of all living and dead stems. Sustained tree recruitment before the mid-19th century was followed by much reduced recruitment, in synchrony with the well-documented increasing trend of winter precipitation in northern Quebec. In combination with more frequent spring floods during the 20th century, the 1941 fire at the shrub site probably reduced the density of conifer stems, increased the abundance of shrubs, and excluded the fire-sensitive balsam fir and eastern larch. The fire also abruptly increased inputs of tree remains into the stream channel. Because of low establishment rate and slow growth of postfire conifers, forest recovery towards prefire tree density is unlikely under present-day conditions. Frequent fires in boreal landscapes, along with the anticipated increase of precipitation, suggest that some floodplains and associated streams may respond similarly to future climate change.

Thermokarst acceleration in Arctic tundra driven by climate change and fire disturbance

One Earth ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yaping Chen ◽  
Mark J. Lara ◽  
Benjamin M. Jones ◽  
Gerald V. Frost ◽  
Feng Sheng Hu
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Arctic Tundra ◽  
Fire Disturbance

scholarly journals Assessment of the Contribution of Russian Forests to Climate Change Mitigation

2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 1096-1109
Author(s):  
E.A. Vaganov ◽  
◽  
B.N. Porfiryev ◽  
A.A. Shirov ◽  
A.Yu. Kolpakov ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ◽  
Greenhouse Gas ◽  
Climate Change Mitigation ◽  
Gas Absorption ◽  
Anthropogenic Emissions ◽  
Gas Emissions ◽  
Sequestration Potential ◽  
Russian Forests ◽  
Change Mitigation

Recent inclusion of the issue of economy decarbonization in the global agenda has been affecting social and political priorities. To lower greenhouse gas emissions, Russian economy has to reduce anthropogenic emissions and maximise the carbon sequestration potential of national forests. The paper demonstrates that Russian forest ecosystems compensate for more than a quarter (almost 27 %) of anthropogenic emissions. However, due to the absence of a reliable, time-tested forest inventory system in Russia, as opposed to leading countries, it is difficult to ensure the sustainable use of forest resources and full accounting of greenhouse gas absorption by forests. The research analyses systemic measures to improve the absorptive capacity of Russian forests as a key element of the mechanism for compensating industrial greenhouse gas emissions, since the global expert community should recognise the contribution of these forests to the global climate change mitigation. Potential economic benefits of increasing the carbon-absorbing capacity of forests are assessed at the regional level. The example of Irkutsk oblast shows that the calculated effect of the analysed measures can amount to 6–7 dollars/ha at the current price of carbon credits; full implementation of these measures in the region can bring up to 480 million US dollars annually, net of expenses. The research proposes to ensure the necessary quality and completeness of data of the State Forest Registry by integrating remote and ground-based field measurements. It is also suggested to enhance institutional and investment support to state forest conservation initiatives, including in the framework of the National Project “Ecology” and forest-climate projects based on public-private partnerships. These measures should be included in the reform of public policy in the field of forest management.

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