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Decreases in Fire Spread Probability with Forest Age Promotes Alternative Community States, Reduced Resilience to Climate Variability and Large Fire Regime Shifts

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Abstract

The generalization that plant communities increase in flammability as they age and invariably lead to resilient self-organized landscape mosaics is being increasingly challenged. Plant communities often exhibit rapidly saturating or even hump-shaped age-flammability trajectories and landscapes often display strong non-linear behaviors, abrupt shifts, and self-reinforcing alternative community states. This plethora of fire-landscape interactions calls for a more general model that considers alternative age-flammability rules. We simulated landscape dynamics assuming communities that (1) increase in flammability with age and (2) gain flammability up to a certain age followed by a slight and moderate loss to a constant value. Simulations were run under combinations of ignition frequency and interannual climatic variability. Age-increasing fire probability promoted high resilience to changes in ignition frequency and climatic variability whereas humpbacked-shaped age-flammability led to strong non-linear behaviors. Moderate (20%) reductions in mature compared to peak flammability produced the least resilient behaviors. The relatively non-flammable mature forest matrix intersected by young flammable patches is prone to break up and disintegrate with slight increases in ignition/climate variability causing large-scale shifts in the fire regime because large fires were able to sweep through the more continuous young/flammable landscape. Contrary to the dominant perception, fire suppression in landscapes with positive feedbacks may effectively reduce fire occurrence by allowing less flammable later stage communities composed of longer lived, obligate seeders to replace earlier stages of light demanding, often more flammable resprouters. Conversely, increases in anthropogenic ignitions, a common global trend of many forested regions may, in synergism with increased climate variability, induce abrupt shifts, and large-scale forest degradation.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We thank Tom Veblen for insightful discussions in the development stages of our model and two anonymous referees for insightful comments. This study was funded by grant BID 1728/OC-AR PICTO Forestal 36801, Agencia Nacional de Promoción Científica y Tecnológica.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratorio Ecotono, Instituto de Investigaciones de Biodiversidad y Medio Ambiente (INIBOMA), CONICET, Universidad Nacional del Comahue, Quintral 1250, 8400, Bariloche, Argentina

    Thomas Kitzberger, Juan H. Gowda & Juan M. Morales

  2. Instituto de Ecología Regional, Universidad Nacional de Tucumán, CC 34 Yerba Buena, 4107, Tucumán, Argentina

    Ezequiel Aráoz

  3. Delegación Regional Patagonia, Administración de Parques Nacionales, Vicealmirante O′Connor 1188, 8400, Bariloche, Argentina

    Mónica Mermoz

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  1. Thomas Kitzberger
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  4. Mónica Mermoz
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  5. Juan M. Morales
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Correspondence to Thomas Kitzberger.

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Author Contributions

Thomas Kitzberger: conceived and designed the study, performed research, analyzed data and wrote the paper. Ezequiel Aráoz, Mónica Mermoz, Juan H. Gowda, and Juan M. Morales: designed the study, performed research, contributed new methods or models and analyzed data.

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Kitzberger, T., Aráoz, E., Gowda, J.H. et al. Decreases in Fire Spread Probability with Forest Age Promotes Alternative Community States, Reduced Resilience to Climate Variability and Large Fire Regime Shifts. Ecosystems 15, 97–112 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10021-011-9494-y

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