Historic Fire Regime of an Upland Oak Forest in South-Central North America

Abstract

Prescribed burning is used in upland oak forests of south-central North America to improve wildlife habitat, reduce fire hazard, restore ecosystem integrity, and maintain biological diversity. However, little is known about the frequency, seasonality, and ignition source of historic fires that shaped these forests. In general, it is believed that fire frequency in upland oak forests of south-central North America was influenced by climate and humans, and decreased since Euro-American settlement; yet there is a dearth of scientific evidence to support this conclusion. The objective of this study was to link the fire history of an upland oak forest in east-central Oklahoma with factors controlling the fire regime. We removed cross-sections from 69 dead post oak (Quercus stellata Wangenh.) trees in a 1 km 2 area of old-growth post oak and blackjack oak (Q. marilandica Münchh.) forest, and determined the tree-ring record and exact dates of fire scars from 1750 to 2005, using standard dendrochronological methods. An increase in fire from the eighteenth to early twenty-first centuries appeared to be associated with changes in human occupation, and there was little evidence linking the frequency, severity, or extent of fires to climate factors including drought, lightning, and late-spring frosts. These findings appeared to contradict the belief that fire decreased from the eighteenth to early twenty-first centuries and appeared to emphasize the importance of anthropogenic ignition to the local fire regime.

Forest Structure and Fire History at Lake Arcadia, Oklahoma County, Oklahoma (1820–2014)

“…4). This result is similar to other studies in the Oklahoma Cross Timbers (Allen and Palmer 2011;DeSantis et al 2010b;Stambaugh et al 2009) and contrary to that reported by Clark et al (2007). Three of four severe fire years (1898,1912,1955) coincided with below average PDSI (drought) conditions.…”

“…DeSantis et al (2010b) Stambaugh et al (2013) found a fire frequency of 2.6 years in a mixed oak-pine (Quercus-Pinus) forest. Masters et al (1995) in a study of fire history in McCurtain County reported a mean fire interval of 3.8 years.…”

“…Quercus stellata has been used successfully for fire history studies in Oklahoma Cross Timbers (Clark et al 2007;Stambaugh et al 2009;DeSantis et al 2010b;Allen and Palmer 2011). The analysis approach of Guyette and Stambaugh (2004) was used to identify fire scars in Q. stellata.…”

Encroachment Dynamics of Juniperus virginiana L. and Mesic Hardwood Species into Cross Timbers Forests of North-Central Oklahoma, USA

“…Measurements of the historical fire return interval pre-European American settlement ranged from 2.9-6.7 years [4][5][6][7][8]. Due to a combination of fire exclusion and favorable recruitment Once the forest areas were identified on each of the 25 properties [20], five field measurement plots per property (one larger property had ten field measurement plots) were randomly located within the forest interior using ArcMAP (Esri, Redlands, CA, USA).…”

A Review on the Dynamics of Prescribed Fire, Tree Mortality, and Injury in Managing Oak Natural Communities to Minimize Economic Loss in North America

“…During the Holocene, increasing fire occurrence, often due to Native American land use practices, favored the dominance of oak-pine (Quercus/Pinus) natural communities such as forests, woodlands, and savannas in North America [5][6][7][8]. In historic times, fire frequency was highest in the oak region during the early European settlement period [9][10][11] when settlers saturated the landscape with fire and initiated a wave of fire that rolled from the eastern seaboard to the tallgrass prairies [12,13]. Widespread catastrophic fires, which burned in logging slash circa the 1850s to 1920s, caused severe destruction on millions of acres and took thousands of lives, bringing the need for wildfire control to national attention.…”