‘Back to the Future’—Oak wood-pasture for wildfire prevention in the Mediterranean

Abstract

In the summer of 2021, enormous wildfires in the Mediterranean eliminated huge areas of mainly coniferous forest, destroyed adjacent settlements and claimed the lives of many people. The fires indicate effects of climate change and expose consequences of rural demographic changes, deficits in regional and touristic development planning and shortcomings in forest policy. This forum article highlights the dimensions of the problem, calls for a paradigm shift and shows solutions. Land abandonment, woody plant encroachment and non-reflective afforestation are leading to increasing amounts of combustible biomass. To prevent disastrous fires in future, fundamental changes in tree species composition, forest structure and management are essential. Plantations of reseeding pines are to be substituted by spacious or periodically open woodlands of long-lived trees with resprouting capacity such as Mediterranean oaks. Biomass-reducing practices including wood-pasture have to be revived in rural and peri-urban areas. Exemplary fire-resistant multifunctional oak woodlands occur throughout the Mediterranean. Urgent and medium-term measures in the burnt areas include promoting natural ecosystem regeneration, developing regionalized seed banks and nurseries to support native genetic resources, fostering vegetation mosaics of groves and multiple-use open and coppice woodland maintained by traditional practices, and in general forest management aiming at fuel biomass reduction and a policy counteracting land abandonment.

Technical Report: Mediterranean wildfires

“…In the past, farmland and open grazing land served as fire buffer areas in the vicinity of the Mediterranean villages (Bergmeier and others, 2021). However, the region is nowadays characterized as an intermingling of wildlands with human settlements, called wildland-urban interfaces (WUI) (Ganteaume and others, 2021).…”

“…However, the region is nowadays characterized as an intermingling of wildlands with human settlements, called wildland-urban interfaces (WUI) (Ganteaume and others, 2021). Modernization and population growth have recently increased the incidence of WUI areas, leading to more urban development adjacent to forest lands and shrublands (Moreira and others, 2020;Bergmeier and others, 2021).…”

“…Similarly, tourism development in many Mediterranean WUI has led to a doubling of fire events since 1970 (Xanthopoulos and others, 2006). Thus, higher human population density and built infrastructure in fire-prone landscapes exacerbated the impacts of the 2021 wildfires (Bergmeier and others, 2021). 7…”

“…In the 1950s, Mediterranean rural areas suffered an exodus driven by macroeconomic reasons and rapid urbanization (Clapp, 2021;Bergmeier and others, 2021). Shepherds and farmers who formerly worked the land and maintained vegetation cover moved to urban areas, allowing abandoned arable lands to be covered with forests and shrubs (Curt and others, 2020;Clapp, 2021;Bergmeier and others, 2021).…”

Priority tree and shrubs for use in Landscape Architecture based on the dynamic states of native vegetation with the highest ecological value in mainland Portugal

“…These tree species normally have broad leaves and reach a larger size, unlike the typical bushes of the initial stages of ecological succession, which usually have narrow and long leaves, with high levels of essential oils [23,24]. The multifunctionality of the landscape is therefore a criterion of increasing interest [25], also in order to prevent destructive wildfires [26].…”