Document


Title

Fire and thinning in an Ohio oak forest: grid-based analyses of fire behavior, environmental conditions, and tree regeneration across a topographic moisture gradient
Document Type: Conference Proceedings
Author(s): Louis R. Iverson; Anantha M. Prasad; Todd F. Hutchinson; Joanne X. Rebbeck; Daniel A. Yaussy
Editor(s): Martin A. Spetich
Publication Year: 2004

Cataloging Information

Keyword(s):
  • Acer rubrum
  • Acer spp.
  • air temperature
  • Carya cordiformis
  • Carya glabra
  • Carya tomentosa
  • central Appalachian Mountains
  • cover type conversion
  • ecology
  • Fagus grandifolia
  • FFS - Fire and Fire Surrogate Study
  • fire management
  • forest management
  • fuel treatments
  • GIS - geographic information system
  • hardwood forest
  • histories
  • light
  • Liriodendron tulipifera
  • moisture
  • Ohio
  • overstory
  • plant communities
  • population density
  • Prunus serotina
  • Quercus alba
  • Quercus coccinea
  • Quercus prinus
  • Quercus rubra
  • Quercus velutina
  • regeneration
  • sampling
  • seedlings
  • soil moisture
  • soil temperature
  • state forests
  • statistical analysis
  • thinning
  • topography
  • weather observations
  • Zaleski State Forest
Region(s):
Record Maintained By:
Record Last Modified: June 1, 2018
FRAMES Record Number: 2557
Tall Timbers Record Number: 17693
TTRS Location Status: In-file
TTRS Call Number: A13.88:SRS-73
TTRS Abstract Status: Okay, Fair use, Reproduced by permission

This bibliographic record was either created or modified by the Tall Timbers Research Station and Land Conservancy and is provided without charge to promote research and education in Fire Ecology. The E.V. Komarek Fire Ecology Database is the intellectual property of the Tall Timbers Research Station and Land Conservancy.

Description

Prescribed fire alone and in combination with thinning were accomplished in late 2000 to spring 2001 at Zaleski State Forest in southern Ohio. Sites were monitored before and after the treatments were applied. Light was assessed via hemispherical photographs taken in July 2000 and 2001. Oak and hickory seedlings and saplings were sampled during those same time periods. Soil moisture was monitored eight times in 2001 via time-domain-reflectometry (TDR). Air temperature was recorded every 2 seconds during the fires, and soil temperature was recorded hourly in the months following the fires. These data allow us to evaluate, in concert with the landscape moisture patterns: (1) aspects of fire behavior, and (2) effects of the thinning and burning on soil moisture and temperature, light, and vegetation. The thin-and-burn treatment, relative to the control, generally resulted in more light, higher soil moisture, higher seasonal soil temperatures, but no short-term effects on oak-hickory regeneration. The integrated moisture index (IMI), a GIS-derived index categorizing landscape into three moisture regimes, was related to many of the measured variables: sites modeled as topographically wetter had more soil moisture, lower fire and seasonal soil temperatures, less light penetration, and less oak and hickory regeneration.

Online Link(s):
Link to this document (3.2 MB; full text; pdf)
Citation:
Iverson, Louis R.; Prasad, Anantha M.; Hutchinson, Todd F.; Rebbeck, Joanne; Yaussy, Daniel A. 2004. Fire and thinning in an Ohio oak forest: grid-based analyses of fire behavior, environmental conditions, and tree regeneration across a topographic moisture gradient. In: Spetich, Martin A. (ed.). Proceedings of the Upland oak ecology symposium: history, current conditions, and sustainability. General Technical Report SRS-GTR-73. Asheville, NC: USDA Forest Service, Southern Research Station. P. 190-197.