Aridity, fire severity and proximity of populations affect the temporal responses of open-habitat birds to wildfires

The Heterogeneity of Burn Severity Affects Bird Density in an Abandoned Mountain Landscape of the Atlantic-Mediterranean Transition

“…In relation to the effects of other well-known fire regime attributes (percentage of burnt area and time since last fire), the spatiotemporal variation in burn severity was found to be the most relevant factor explaining the abundance patterns of our target species (39% of the 28 modeled species, see Table 3). These results confirm the importance of accounting for burn severity when assessing the impact of wildfires on bird diversity (see e.g., [27,38]), which has clear implications for fire management (see meta-analysis in [24]). Overall, the spatiotemporal variation of burn severity was positively correlated with the abundance patterns for 9 species (Table 3), which can be explained by an increase in the habitat heterogeneity created by the wildfires [19,26,39].…”

“…We explore to what extent the spatiotemporal variation in burn severity has affected the abundance of birds in relation to other well-known fire regime attributes (such as percentage of burnt area, time since last fire and fire recurrence [see e.g. [23,26,27]). We took advantage of the satellite images of Sentinel 2 and Landsat missions (freely available from European Space Agency and NASA, respectively) to compute burn severity indicators over the last 11 years (from 2010 to 2020) and a standardized bird survey carried out along the breeding season of year 2021 to explore those relationships.…”

Mice population dynamics and structure over time and space after wildfires

“…In our non‐intervention burnt areas, rodents mainly recovered from the perimeter by dispersing juveniles. However, in the long term, non‐intervention will allow succession to produce woody encroachment, and the attendant collapse of open‐habitat small‐mammals (Puig‐Gironès et al., 2022; Torre & Díaz, 2004), and will likely increase the fire risk (Brotons et al., 2013; Duane et al., 2021). If salvage logging is chosen, based on our results, maintaining good connectivity between burnt and adjacent unburnt areas is crucial.…”

“…This may be achieved through wood debris piles, which provide shelter, reduce erosion, and benefit plant regeneration and animal presence (Mauri & Pons, 2019; Puig‐Gironès et al., 2020; Sullivan et al., 2012). For open‐habitat maintenance, management should begin 5 years after fire, when the habitat is no longer optimal for open‐habitat specialists (Puig‐Gironès et al., 2022) and mice have likely recovered (Torre & Díaz, 2004). This may benefit Algerian mice, an open‐habitat specialist, which is undergoing a moderate‐to‐serious population decline in our study area (Torre et al., 2018).…”

Temporal differences in snail diversity responses to wildfires and salvage logging

“…Fire is a key element that has a major influence on ecosystems throughout the world (Bowman et al 2009, Pausas & Keeley 2009. Species tend to peak in abundance at different times after fires (Moretti et al 2004), and so some authors back the idea that a matrix of fire-aged patches will maximize species diversitythe so-called 'pyrodiversity' (Parr & Andersen 2006, Kelly et al 2015 and favour endangered open-habitat species (Brotons et al 2008, Santos et al 2009, Puig-Gironès et al 2022a. In general, greater between-site diversity (β-diversity) and landscape diversity (i.e., heterogeneity across space) are predicted to occur after fires (Hammill et al 2018).…”