Long-term changes in an oak forest's woody understory and herb layer with repeated burning¹

Ruffed grouse brood habitat use in a mixed hardwood forest: Implications for forest management in the Appalachians

“…Fire can control competing woody stems, stimulate herbaceous plant growth from the seedbank, and stimulate insect emergence by facilitating soil warming (Euler and Thompson, 1978;Rogers, 1985). During 17 years of prescribed fire in an Illinois oak forest, cover and abundance of summer herbs increased (Bowles et al, 2007). These fires also decreased midstory shrub density from 7000 to 4340 stems/ha, similar to the shrub density preferred by broods in this study.…”

Gradient analysis of an eastern sand savanna's woody vegetation, and its long-term responses to restored fire processes

“…High-intensity fires probably consumed extremely heavy woody fuel loads that had accumulated over time, allowing greater impacts than initial low-intensity fire. The stability of canopy cover and basal area with continued burning over a 20-year period probably reflects the inability of repeated low-intensity fires to impact canopy oaks over about 30 cm dbh, a common effect in oak savanna and forest (Nielsen et al, 2003;Abella et al, 2004;Bowles et al, 2007). For example, our measure of low fire intensity based on 1 m scorch height, corresponds to very low probabilities of causing mortality to black and white oaks that exceed this size (Loomis, 1973).…”

Short-term effects of burn season on flowering phenology of savanna plants

“…Long-term annual burning has proven to be effective in maintaining ground layer vegetation richness in oak forests (Bowles et al 2007). However, that work only compared annual fall burns with unburned plots, thus not permitting determination of whether a less frequent burning regime, such as every other year, would produce the same effect.…”