The role of fire in the Central Yunnan Plateau ecosystem, southwestern China

Su, Wenhua; Shi, Zhan; Zhou, Rui; Zhao, Yuan-Jiao; Zhang, Guangfei

doi:10.1016/j.foreco.2015.05.015

Cited by 32 publications

(23 citation statements)

References 53 publications

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“…The full extent of pine savannahs in Asia may be dramatically under-described in East Asia: the hills of southwest China are draped in Pinus yunnanensis and P. kesiya 'forest', where fire has been suppressed as a result of government policy [81,82]. The species are closely related [83] and recent evidence suggests that fire may have been an intricate part of these systems: P. yunnanensis in Yunnan develops grassy stage juveniles where it has been burnt, climate models predict that the region should be fire-prone [81], and a study on regeneration in P. yunnanensis savannahs subjected to wildfire indicate that more than 90% of native trees and shrubs recovered after fires, many resprouting from underground bud banks and that P. yunannensis is itself serotinous [62].…”

Section: (C) Pine Savannahsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Savannahs of Asia: antiquity, biogeography, and an uncertain future

Ratnam

Tomlinson

Rasquinha

et al. 2016

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

151

212

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The savannahs of Asia remain locally unrecognized as distinctive ecosystems, and continue to be viewed as degraded forests or seasonally dry tropical forests. These colonial-era legacies are problematic, because they fail to recognize the unique diversity of Asian savannahs and the critical roles of fire and herbivory in maintaining ecosystem health and diversity. In this review, we show that: the palaeo-historical evidence suggests that the savannahs of Asia have existed for at least 1 million years, long before widespread landscape modification by humans; savannah regions across Asia have levels of C 4 grass endemism and diversity that are consistent with area-based expectations for non-Asian savannahs; there are at least three distinct Asian savannah communities, namely deciduous broadleaf savannahs, deciduous fine-leafed and spiny savannahs and evergreen pine savannahs, with distinct functional ecologies consistent with fire-and herbivory-driven community assembly. Via an analysis of savannah climate domains on other continents, we map the potential extent of savannahs across Asia. We find that the climates of African savannahs provide the closest analogues for those of Asian deciduous savannahs, but that Asian pine savannahs occur in climates different to any of the savannahs in the southern continents. Finally, we review major threats to the persistence of savannahs in Asia, including the mismanagement of fire and herbivory, alien woody encroachment, afforestation policies and future climate uncertainty associated with the changing Asian monsoon. Research agendas that target these issues are urgently needed to manage and conserve these ecosystems.This article is part of the themed issue 'Tropical grassy biomes: linking ecology, human use and conservation'.

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Section: (C) Pine Savannahsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Savannahs of Asia: antiquity, biogeography, and an uncertain future

Ratnam

Tomlinson

Rasquinha

et al. 2016

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

151

212

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“…Even though some of the native species in non-fire-prone forests can resprout after wildfire, the percentage of resprouting species is much smaller than in fire-prone forests. For example, in Australian fire-prone forests, the percentage of woody species capable of resprouting can reach 90% [49], and in a South-western China forest 100% of the trees and 93% shrubs resprouted within six months after fire [50]. Having a smaller percentage of species capable of resprouting is one of the reasons why non-fire-prone forests have their biodiversity more negatively impacted by fire events than fire-prone forests.…”

Section: Species Responsementioning

confidence: 99%

Post-Fire Resprouting in New Zealand Woody Vegetation: Implications for Restoration

Teixeira

Curran

Jameson

et al. 2020

Forests

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Resprouting is an important trait that allows plants to persist after fire and is considered a key functional trait in woody plants. While resprouting is well documented in fire-prone biomes, information is scarce in non-fire-prone ecosystems, such as New Zealand (NZ) forests. Our objective was to investigate patterns of post-fire resprouting in NZ by identifying the ability of species to resprout and quantifying the resprouting rates within the local plant community. Fire occurrence is likely to increase in NZ as a consequence of climate change, and this investigation addresses an important knowledge gap needed for planning restoration actions in fire-susceptible regions. The study was conducted in two phases: (1) A detailed review of the resprouting ability of the NZ woody flora, and (2) a field study where the post-fire responses of plants were quantified. The field study was undertaken in the eastern South Island, where woody plants (>5 cm diameter at 30 cm height) were sampled in 10 plots (10x10 m), five- and 10-months post-fire. The research synthesized the resprouting ability of 73 woody species and is the first to provide extensive quantitative data on resprouting in NZ. Most of the canopy dominant species were non-resprouters, but many smaller trees and shrubs were capable of resprouting, despite their evolution in an environment with low fire frequency. Species composition and abundance were important predictors of resprouting patterns among plots, with similar communities resulting in similar resprouting responses. Resprouting capacity provides species with a competitive advantage in the post-fire recovery. We suggest that it is possible to engineer more fire resilient restoration plantings by planting higher proportions of the resprouters identified in this study. The incorporation of resprouting as a trait in restoration plans is likely to be relevant not just in NZ, but also in other non-fire-prone regions facing increases in fire frequency.

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“…The air temperature in spring is fairly high, due to the low latitude of the study region and low rainfall (equal to only 10%-20% of annual precipitation during spring) ( Figure 1b) which results in high frequency forest fires ( Figure 1c). In contrast, rainfall in summer is quite abundant, accounting for 60% of annual precipitation (Su et al, 2015).…”

Section: Site Descriptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As a fire-prone ecosystem, mixed coniferous and broad-leaved forests that dominated by Yunnan Pine (Pinus yunnanensis) and several species in Quercus and Lithocarpus are a typical forest landscape in central Yunnan Plateau, South-west China (Li and Sun, 1998;Han et al, 2015). This region possesses a semi-humid subtropical climate, which is characterized by an eminent dry season from December to the following May, creating a period of high fire vulnerability (Zhang et al, 1994;Su et al, 2015). Although the spatial and temporal distributions of fires in this region have been described and predicted with regard to climate condition (Zhang et al, 1994;Wang et al, 2015;Ying, 2017), and the fuel flammability has been explored with experiments (Li et al, 2006;Wang et al, 2016), there is little knowledge about the fuel moisture variation that is known to be critical for fire risk in this region.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Moisture content variations in soil and plant of post-fire regenerating forests in central Yunnan Plateau, Southwest China

et al. 2019

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Plant moisture content (PMC) is used as an indicator of forest flammability, which is assumed to be affected by climate drought. However, the fire-induced drought stress on PMC and its spatial and temporal variations are unclear. Based on a parallel monitoring experiment from 2014 to 2015, this study compared the PMCs and soil moisture contents (SMC) at five post-fire sites in central Yunnan Plateau, Southwest China. The number of years since last fire (YSF), season, topographic position, plant species and tissue type (leaf and branch) were selected as causal factors of the variations in PMC and SMC. A whole year parallel monitoring and sampling in the post-fire communities of 1, 2, 5, 11 and 30 YSF indicated that drought stress in surface soils was the strongest in spring within the first 5 years after burning, and the SMC was regulated by topography, with 64.6% variation in soil moisture accounted for by YSF (25.7%), slope position (22.1%) and season (10.8%). The temporal variations of PMC and SMC differed at both interannual and seasonal scales, but the patterns were consistent across topographic positions. PMC differed significantly between leaves and branches, and among three growth-forms. The mean PMC was lower in broad-leaved evergreen species and higher in conifer species. Season and soil temperature were the primary determinants of PMC, accounting for 19.1% and 8.3% of variation in PMC, respectively. This indicated phenology-related growth rather than drought stress in soil as the primary driver of seasonal changes in PMC. The significant variations of PMC among growth forms and species revealed that seasonal soil temperature change and dominant species in forest communities are useful indicators of fire risk assessment in this region.

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The role of fire in the Central Yunnan Plateau ecosystem, southwestern China

Cited by 32 publications

References 53 publications

Savannahs of Asia: antiquity, biogeography, and an uncertain future

Savannahs of Asia: antiquity, biogeography, and an uncertain future

Post-Fire Resprouting in New Zealand Woody Vegetation: Implications for Restoration

Moisture content variations in soil and plant of post-fire regenerating forests in central Yunnan Plateau, Southwest China

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