1 Estimating the time since fire of long-unburnt Eucalyptus salubris (Myrtaceae) stands in 2 the Great Western Woodlands 3 4 Carl R. Gosper A,B,C , Suzanne M. Prober B, Colin J. Yates A and Georg Wiehl B 5 6 AScience Division, Department of Environment and Conservation, Locked Bag 104, Bentley 7 Delivery Centre, WA 6983, Australia. 8 BCSIRO Ecosystem Sciences, Private Bag 5, Wembley WA 6913 Australia 9 CCorresponding author. Email:
[email protected] 10 11 This is a pre-publication version. The definitive version of the paper has been published 12 in the Australian Journal of Botany on the CSIRO PUBLISHING website. The definitive 13 version can be found here: 14 Gosper, C.R., Prober, S.M., Yates, C.J. and Wiehl, G. (in press) Estimating the time since fire 15 of long-unburnt Eucalyptus salubris stands in the Great Western Woodlands. Australian 16 Journal of Botany doi: 10.1071/BT12212 17 http://www.publish.csiro.au/paper/BT12212.htm 18 19 1 For the definitive version of this paper, go to: http://www.publish.csiro.au/paper/BT12212.htm 20 Abstract. Establishing the time since fire in infrequently burnt, yet fire-prone, 21 communities is a significant challenge. Until this can be resolved for >50 year timeframes, 22 our capacity to understand important ecological processes, such as the periods required for 23 development of habitat features, will remain limited. We characterised the relationship 24 between observable tree growth rings, plant age and plant size in Eucalyptus salubris F. 25 Muell. in the globally significant Great Western Woodlands in south-western Australia.