Fire – wind interactions
I’ve just had the opportunity to see some of the consequences of the hurricane Patricia that affected Jalisco, Mexico, last weekend. Here is the effects on a Pinus dauglasiana forest in the Sierra de Manantlán biosfere reserve. Some parts of this forest had burned several years ago (< 10 years) mainly as understory fire, and some trees were injured at the base but most survived (as in any typical undertory fires); there were also some crowning in small patches. Fire killed many understory fire-sensitive broadleaved shrubs, and were replaced by a high density of the pine seedlings (Fig. 1); there were also some plants resprouting (e.g., Quercus, Arbutus, etc.). Now, the strong winds of the hurricane is interacting with fire in two ways: (1) the wind have killed some of the fire-injured trees that had survived the fire (Fig. 1); and (2) the wind has greatly increased the fuel in the forest floor, even in the places where trees were not blown down (Fig. 2), which implies an increase in the chance for a surface fire of high intensity during the next dry season. That is, this seems an opportunity to study the interaction between these two disturbances, fire and hurricanes.
Fig. 1. Pinus dauglasiana forest after a fire (see the seedling regeneration) followed by an hurricane.
Fig. 2. The forest floor of the Pinus dauglasiana forest (unburned) has greatly increased the fuel after the hurricane even in the places where trees were not blown down; the whole forest has a carpet of recently fallen branches and leaves.