Historic Fire Regimes of Eastern Great Basin (USA) Mountains
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Historic Fire Regimes of Eastern Great Basin (USA) Mountains Reconstructed from Tree Rings Stanley G. Kitchen A dissertation submitted to the faculty of Brigham Young University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Bruce A. Roundy, Chair Joel C. Janetski Robin J. Tausch Matthew F. Bekker Steven L. Petersen Department of Plant and Wildlife Sciences Brigham Young University April 2010 Copyright © [2010] [Stanley G. Kitchen] All Rights Reserved ABSTRACT Historic Fire Regimes of Eastern Great Basin (USA) Mountains Reconstructed from Tree Rings Stanley G. Kitchen Department of Plant and Wildlife Sciences Doctor of Philosophy Management of natural landscapes requires knowledge of key disturbance processes and their effects. Fire and forest histories provide valuable insight into how fire and vegetation varied and interacted in the past. I constructed multi-century fire chronologies for 10 sites on six mountain ranges representative of the eastern Great Basin (USA), a region in which historic fire information was lacking. I also constructed tree recruitment chronologies for two sites. I use these chronologies to address three research foci. First, using fire-scar data from four heterogeneous sites, I assert that mean fire interval (MFI) values calculated from composite chronologies provide suitable estimates of point MFI (PMFI) when sample area size is ≈½ ha. I also suggest that MFI values for single trees can be used to estimate PMFI after applying a correction factor. Next, I infer climate effects on regional fire patterns using 10 site chronologies and tree-ring-based indices of drought and of El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and Pacific Decadal Oscillation ([PDO), Pacific Ocean surface temperature variability known to affect North American climate. Regional fire years (≥33% of recording sites) were synchronized by wet-dry cycles where the probability of occurrence was highest in the first year of drought following a wet phase and lowest when climate conditions transitioned from dry to wet. Regional fire probability was highest when ENSO and PDO were negative (Southwest pattern). Local fire years occurred under a broad range of conditions. Fire seasonality was bimodal with early and late-season fires dominant. I imply that Native American burning practices were responsible for differences in historic and modern fire seasonality. Lastly, I assess fire regime and tree recruitment variability within two fire-sheds. PMFI varied more than 10-fold within each site. A mixed-severity regime was dominant. A majority (>60%) of fires were small (<10 ha) but together accounted for a minor proportion of area burned. Recruitment pulses varied spatially from stand to landscape-scales and were often synchronous with multi-decade, fire-quiescent periods. I recommend that management strategies employ fire and fire-surrogate treatments to restore disturbance processes to these and similar landscapes at spatial and temporal scales consistent with the historic record. Keywords: fire scars, dendrochronology, point mean fire interval, climate-fire interactions, anthropogenic fire, mixed-severity fire, mixed-conifer forests, fire restoration ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENT I would first like to thank Durant McArthur as a mentor and a friend. He cared enough to push me out of my comfort zone and then showed me the trust I needed to find the confidence to try. I thank Peter Brown and Emily Heyerdahl for their encouragement and unselfish commitment to share with me their knowledge of all phases of dendroecological research and to patiently listen and respond to my less-seasoned thoughts about how to do the work. Thanks to Bob Campbell and Linda Chappell of the Fishlake National Forest for their enthusiasm and logistical support. Also for logistical help, I thank Jolie Pollet and Doug Page of the Bureau of Land Management and Todd Williams of Great Basin National Park. I thank members of my committee for an appropriate mix of patience and prodding. For help with field collection, sample processing, and data management I thank M. Weber, D. Bentley, B. Bright, S. Carlson, A. Kitchen, J. Kitchen, B. Latta, C. Jones, G. Jorgensen, K. Miller, M. Nielson, H. Neely, M. Proett, B. Pyne, M. Pyne, G. Schenk, J. Taylor, T. Thygerson, H. Vice, N. Williams, and T. Young. For help with figures I thank Brian Reeves. I thank my children and extended family for their love, support, and sincere interest in the work and for understanding when dad had to be gone so often. Last but not least, I thank my wife and best friend Chris who, more than anyone else gave me motivation to keep going until the job was finished. Brigham Young University iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction ............................................................................................................................................................... 1 Literature Cited ...................................................................................................................................................... 8 Chapter 1 – Composite and Single-tree Fire Chronologies from Heterogeneous Landscapes: Strategies for Estimating Point Mean Fire Interval ........................................................................................................................ 17 Abstract. .............................................................................................................................................................. 17 Introduction ......................................................................................................................................................... 18 Study Sites ........................................................................................................................................................... 23 Field Methods ...................................................................................................................................................... 25 Laboratory Methods ............................................................................................................................................ 27 Results ................................................................................................................................................................. 30 Discussion ............................................................................................................................................................ 32 Acknowledgements ............................................................................................................................................. 37 References ........................................................................................................................................................... 38 Chapter 2 – Climate and Human Influences on Historical Fires (1400-1900) in the Eastern Great Basin (USA) ..... 59 Abstract ............................................................................................................................................................... 59 Introduction ......................................................................................................................................................... 60 Study Area ........................................................................................................................................................... 62 Biogeographic setting ...................................................................................................................................... 62 Human occupation .......................................................................................................................................... 64 Methods .............................................................................................................................................................. 67 Historical surface fire chronologies ................................................................................................................. 67 Fire seasonality ................................................................................................................................................ 67 Climate effects on fire occurrence .................................................................................................................. 69 Results ................................................................................................................................................................. 70 Fire seasonality ................................................................................................................................................ 71 Climate effects on fire occurrence .................................................................................................................. 73 iv Discussion ............................................................................................................................................................ 74 Fire seasonality ................................................................................................................................................ 75 Climate effects on fire occurrence .................................................................................................................. 80 Conclusions .......................................................................................................................................................... 84