Climatic variability, fire, and vegetation modeling in the North American Central Grassland Region
- Oregon State Univ., Corvallis, OR (United States)
In developing an equilibrium vegetation model for assessing the sensitivity of natural vegetation to climatic change in the Central Grasslands, we encountered difficulties in establishing solely climatic determinants for grasslands. Under the normal climate, woody plant dominance was predicted for much of the region supporting open grassland at the time of European settlement. Climatic data for historic periods and a fire model were used to test whether grass dominance was promoted by (1) climatic periods distinct from the normal period, (2) by fire, or (3) by the interactive effect of both. Grass/woody ratios in test simulations exhibited spatio-temporal variation produced by complex interactions among PET, precipitation seasonality, competition for soil moisture, and fuel characteristics determining fire intensity. Results support concepts of plant community thresholds and multiple steady states in the Central Grassland region.
- OSTI ID:
- 7015981
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-940894-; CODEN: BECLAG
- Journal Information:
- Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America; (United States), Vol. 75:2; Conference: Annual Ecological Society of America (ESA) meeting: science and public policy, Knoxville, TN (United States), 7-11 Aug 1994; ISSN 0012-9623
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
Similar Records
Ecological response surfaces nested in a process-based vegetation-water blance model to investigate species-level sensitivity to projected climatic chanage in the North American Central Grasslands
Assessing the Roles of Fire Frequency and Precipitation in Determining Woody Plant Expansion in Central U.S. Grasslands