Effect of spring burning on the surface energy balance in a tallgrass prairie

Bremer, Dale J.; Ham, Jay M.

doi:10.1016/s0168-1923(99)00034-9

Cited by 85 publications

(68 citation statements)

References 37 publications

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“…It is also likely that spring-burning released mineral nutrients to support the new growth, similar to comparable findings in literature [35,36]. Additionally, post-burning dark coloration of the soil surface usually causes earlier warming of soils [37] to induce early spring growth. A controlled study on combined effects of spring-burning and harvest duration on recovery of mixed NWSG stands in the study area may add valuable information on their management.…”

Section: Implications On Yield Sustainabilitysupporting

confidence: 82%

Yield Response of Native Warm-Season Forage Grasses to Harvest Intervals and Durations in Mixed Stands

2014

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Tolerance to frequent defoliations is critical for native warm-season grasses managed for forage and wildlife habitat. Yield response of big bluestem (Andropogon gerardii), indiangrass (Sorghastrum nutans), and little bluestem (Schizachyrium scoparium) to treatments (30-, 40-, 60-, 90-or 120-d harvest intervals) and durations were assessed on early-succession mixed stands. Over three years, phased harvestings were initiated in May, on sets of randomized plots, in five replications to produce one-, two-, and three-year old stands, by the third year. Each plot had marked indiangrass and big bluestem plants which were hand-clipped on harvest-days before whole-plot harvesting. Species yields were greater in first-than second-year plots but not affected by treatments. June-September yields in 2008 were greatest for the 30-d, and more in the first-(8472 kg ha ) plots. In 2009, yields were also greater in first-than second-year plots but without treatment effects. Recovery yields showed no treatment effect, but were about 67% less for second-compared to first-year plots and much less than plots never harvested before. Data suggest that harvesting similar mixed native warm-season grass stands at 30-to 40-d intervals may provide good hay yields without compromising post-season stand recovery for multiple uses.

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Section: Implications On Yield Sustainabilitysupporting

confidence: 82%

Yield Response of Native Warm-Season Forage Grasses to Harvest Intervals and Durations in Mixed Stands

2014

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“…Soil sampling is still required to determine bulk density in this method. A third approach is to measure heat capacity directly using heat pulse sensors (Bremer and Ham, 1999;Ham and Knapp, 1998). The second objective of this study was to compare these three methods for determining soil heat capacity.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Soil Heat Storage Measurements in Energy Balance Studies

Ochsner¹,

Sauer²,

Horton

2007

Agronomy Journal

109

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Energy balance studies require knowledge of the heat flux at the soil surface. This flux is determined by summing the heat flux at a reference depth (z r ) some centimeters below the surface and the rate of change of heat storage in the soil above z r . The rate of change of heat storage, or heat storage for short (DS), is calculated from soil volumetric heat capacity (C) and temperature. The objectives of this study were to determine how choices regarding z r , C measurements, and DS calculations all affect the accuracy of DS data. Heat transfer theory and data from three field sites were used toward these ends. In some studies, shallow reference depths have been used and DS neglected. Our results indicate that when z r is sufficiently deep to permit accurate heat flux measurements, DS is too large to neglect. Three methods for determining C were evaluated: soil sampling, the ThetaProbe soil moisture sensor, and heat pulse sensors. When C was determined using all three methods simultaneously, the estimates agreed to within 6% on average; however, the temporal variability of C was best recorded with the automated heat pulse sensors. Three approaches for calculating DS were also tested. The common approach of letting C vary in time but neglecting its time derivative caused errors when soil water content was changing. These errors exceeded 200 W m 22 in some cases. The simple approach of assuming a constant C performed similarly. We introduce a third approach that accounts for the time derivative of C and yields the most accurate DS data.M EASUREMENTS of the surface energy balance provide valuable scientific information. These measurements contribute greatly to our understanding of the dynamic transfers of water, energy, and trace gases at the Earth's surface. Energy balance studies in terrestrial ecosystems require measurements of soil heat flux. Typically, soil heat flux is measured at a reference depth a few centimeters below the soil surface rather than directly at the surface (Ochsner et al., 2006). The heat flux at the surface is then calculated as the sum of the flux at the reference depth and the rate of change of heat storage above the reference depth (DS).The heat storage is estimated based on the soil volumetric heat capacity, C, and temperature, T. The formal relationship iswhere z r is the reference depth, t is time, and T 0 is an arbitrarily assigned reference temperature. In this study, we chose T 0 5

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“…Except when used for permanent land clearing, fire usually triggers a strong local-scale vegetation regrowth response lasting years to decades depending upon the ecosystem (van der Werf et al, 2003;Goulden et al, 2011); hence the resulting atmospheric CO 2 anomaly and the concurrent global CO 2 fertilization are of shorter duration than after fossil fuel combustion. Fire also causes major modifications to land-atmosphere exchanges of energy through altered surface albedo and sensible/latent heat partitioning (Bremer and Ham, 1999;Amiro et al, 2006). Besides a short-term decrease due to surface blackening, local albedo generally increases after a fire event, thereby leading to a regional-scale cooling that is consequential at the global scale (Ward et al, 2012;Landry et al, 2015).…”

Section: J-s Landry and H D Matthews: Fire Vs Fossil Fuel Combusmentioning

confidence: 99%

Non-deforestation fire vs. fossil fuel combustion: the source of CO<sub>2</sub> emissions affects the global carbon cycle and climate responses

Landry

Matthews

2016

Biogeosciences

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Abstract. Non-deforestation fire -i.e., fire that is typically followed by the recovery of natural vegetation -is arguably the most influential disturbance in terrestrial ecosystems, thereby playing a major role in carbon exchanges and affecting many climatic processes. The radiative effect from a given atmospheric CO 2 perturbation is the same for fire and fossil fuel combustion. However, major differences exist per unit of CO 2 emitted between the effects of non-deforestation fire vs. fossil fuel combustion on the global carbon cycle and climate, because (1) fossil fuel combustion implies a net transfer of carbon from geological reservoirs to the atmospheric, oceanic, and terrestrial pools, whereas fire occurring in terrestrial ecosystems does not; (2) the average lifetime of the atmospheric CO 2 increase is longer when originating from fossil fuel combustion compared to fire, due to the strong vegetation regrowth following fire disturbances in terrestrial ecosystems; and (3) other impacts, for example on land surface albedo, also differ between fire and fossil fuel combustion. The main purpose of this study is to illustrate the consequences from these fundamental differences between fossil fuel combustion and non-deforestation fires using 1000-year simulations of a coupled climate-carbon model with interactive vegetation. We assessed emissions from both pulse and stable fire regime changes, considering both the gross (carbon released from combustion) and net (fire-caused change in land carbon, also accounting for vegetation decomposition and regrowth, as well as climatecarbon feedbacks) fire CO 2 emissions. In all cases, we found substantial differences from equivalent amounts of emissions produced by fossil fuel combustion. These findings suggest that side-by-side comparisons of non-deforestation fire and fossil fuel CO 2 emissions -implicitly implying that they have similar effects per unit of CO 2 emitted -should therefore be avoided, particularly when these comparisons involve gross fire emissions, because the reservoirs from which these emissions are drawn have very different residence times (millions of years for fossil fuel; years to centuries for vegetation and soil-litter). Our results also support the notion that most net emissions occur relatively soon after fire regime shifts and then progressively approach zero. Overall, our study calls for the explicit representation of fire activity as a valuable step to foster a more accurate understanding of its impacts on global carbon cycling and temperature, as opposed to conceiving fire effects as congruent with the consequences from fossil fuel combustion.

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Effect of spring burning on the surface energy balance in a tallgrass prairie

Cited by 85 publications

References 37 publications

Yield Response of Native Warm-Season Forage Grasses to Harvest Intervals and Durations in Mixed Stands

Yield Response of Native Warm-Season Forage Grasses to Harvest Intervals and Durations in Mixed Stands

Soil Heat Storage Measurements in Energy Balance Studies

Non-deforestation fire vs. fossil fuel combustion: the source of CO<sub>2</sub> emissions affects the global carbon cycle and climate responses

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Effect of spring burning on the surface energy balance in a tallgrass prairie

Cited by 85 publications

References 37 publications

Yield Response of Native Warm-Season Forage Grasses to Harvest Intervals and Durations in Mixed Stands

Yield Response of Native Warm-Season Forage Grasses to Harvest Intervals and Durations in Mixed Stands

Soil Heat Storage Measurements in Energy Balance Studies

Non-deforestation fire vs. fossil fuel combustion: the source of CO&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt; emissions affects the global carbon cycle and climate responses

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About

Non-deforestation fire vs. fossil fuel combustion: the source of CO<sub>2</sub> emissions affects the global carbon cycle and climate responses