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Author(s):
Melanie Miller
Year Published:

Cataloging Information

Topic(s):
Fire Effects
Ecological - First Order
Soil Heating
Ecological - Second Order
Vegetation
Soils
Ecosystem(s):
Montane dry mixed-conifer forest

NRFSN number: 11952
FRAMES RCS number: 14112
Record updated:

In a western larch/Douglas-fir forest type in western Montana, 9 spring and 11 fall under story burns were conducted. Multiple regression equations related the number of Vaccinium globulare (blue huckleberry) stems present 1 and 2 years after fire to the number present before fire, prefire fuel loadings, moisture content of fuel, duff and soil, environmental conditions, fuel reduction, fire intensity, and temperatures reached at duff and soil surfaces during the fires. Postfire Vaccinium numbers were most closely related to the number of Vaccinium present before fire. The number of sprouts depended upon the fire treatment received by stems and rhizomes. There was no evidence of any seasonal variation in the physiological ability of Vaccinium to produce sprouts. In the spring, mostly fine fuels burned; in the fall, dry large fuels and duff layers often burned. All spring fires increased Vaccinium stem numbers. Plants were pruned but high duff and soil moisture protected rhizomes from heat. Many more rhizomes were killed during fall fires than spring fires. Soil moisture was too low to protect rhizomes from the great amounts of heat released.

Citation

Miller, Melanie. 1977. Response of blue huckleberry to prescribed fires in a western Montana larch-fir forest. Res. Pap. INT-RP-188. Ogden, UT: USDA Forest Service, Intermountain Forest and Range Experiment Station. 33 p.

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