The Impact of Wet Season & Dry Season Prescribed Fires on Miami Rock Ridge Pineland, Everglades National Park
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Material Information

Title:
The Impact of Wet Season & Dry Season Prescribed Fires on Miami Rock Ridge Pineland, Everglades National Park Report SFRC-86/06
Creator:
South Florida Natural Resources Center/South Florida Research Center, Everglades National Park
James B. Snyder
Place of Publication:
Homestead
Florida
Publisher:
National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior
Publication Date:

Subjects

Subjects / Keywords:
Fire ecology
Pine
Everglades National Park (Fla.)

Notes

Abstract:
In the subtropical pine forests on oolitic limestone in Dade County, Florida, Pinus elliottii var. densa grows over a species-rich understory (more than 128 spp.) of shrubby hardwoods (mostly tropical evergreen species), palms, and herbs, including several endemic taxa. Fires prevent rapid conversion to hardwood forest. To compare the response of these pinelands to burning during the lightning fire season (hot, wet, summer months) and the management fire season (cooler, drier, winter months), paired burns were conducted at two sites in Everglades National Park, one burned 3.5 yr previously and the other 6 yr. Aboveground understory biomass and nutrients were measured immediately before and after, and at 2, 7, and 12 mo after the four burns. The burns topkilled all the understory vegetation. The fires volatilized 1-1.5 kg/m2 of organic matter and 5.7-9.5 g/m2 of N. Meteorological inputs and symbiotic plus nonsymbiotic fixation should easily replace N lost in the burns. Losses of P, K, Ca, and Mg were not detectable except for K in one of the burns. The rapid understory recovery was almost entirely vegetative regrowth of the topkilled plants. Pine seedlings were abundant after the wet season burns, however. Herbs and palms recovered dry mass more rapidly than hardwoods and reached preburn levels within 1 yr. Hardwoods recovered only 18-39% of their preburn biomass. Total understory vegetation recovery was 27-63% of initial amounts, but leaves recovered 58-93%. Net primary productivity the first year after burning was 144-200 g/m2. Recovery of nutrients was more rapid than biomass because of higher nutrient concentrations in regrowth tissues. Some herb and palm nutrient standing crops reached preburn levels within 2 mo. After the burns litter mass and nutrients often showed an initial decrease before recovery began. At 1 yr litter mass was 42-62% of the preburn amount. Annual pine needlefall averaged 260 and 320 g/m2 at the two sites. The amount of hardwood recovery was not determined by season of burning; higher fire temperatures (wet season burn in one case, dry season burn in the other) resulted in less recovery. ( English )

Record Information

Source Institution:
Florida International University
Holding Location:
South Florida Natural Resource Center
Rights Management:
Please contact the owning institution for licensing and permissions. It is the user's responsibility to ensure use does not violate any third party rights.
Resource Identifier:
I 29.95: SFRC- 86/06 ( sudoc )