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Fire History and Fire Regimes Shifts in Patagonian Temperate Forests

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Dendroecology

Part of the book series: Ecological Studies ((ECOLSTUD,volume 231))

Abstract

Fire has been a frequent disturbance in Patagonia. The presence of charcoal in sedimentary records covering the last 44,000 years suggests that natural fires played a significant role in shaping the landscape before the arrival of Native Americans ca. 14,500–12,500 years ago. Dendrochronological studies focused on the reconstruction of fire histories have been conducted in the Patagonian forests on both sides of the Andes Cordillera, beginning in the late 1990s. Here, we review the present knowledge of the history of fires in temperate forests in Patagonia, their main drivers, and discuss the evidence and impacts of burns and reburns on post-fire response, as well as possible mechanisms to shift into alternative stable states. Dendrochronology was extremely useful to develop multi-century fire histories in Araucaria araucana, Pilgerodendron uviferum, Fitzroya cupressoides and Austrocedrus chilensis and mixed Austrocedrus-Nothofagus dombeyi forests in Patagonia. In the case of Araucaria, Austrocedrus and Pilgerodendron forests, dendrochronological reconstructions show diverse and heterogeneous patterns of fire frequency related to changes in human activities and settlement processes over the last centuries. Fire history reconstructions document infrequent events in the Fitzroya wet rainforests, with ca. 800-year old in the Costal Range in South-Central Chile and ca. 1000-year old chronologies in the Argentinean Andes. Climate variability has a significant influence on fire occurrence in these Patagonian forests. Fire events have been strongly associated with low moisture availability linked to El Niño – Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and the Southern Annular Mode (SAM), the major climate drivers promoting fire. Future directions and challenges for fire history studies in Patagonian forests are proposed at the end of this chapter.

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Acknowledgments

We thank the Administración de Parques Nacionales (National Parks Administration of Argentina) and private owners for sampling permissions during the last decades. IAM was supported by the Agencia Nacional de Promoción Científica y Tecnológica de Argentina (grant PICT 2012-1891). AH thanks National Science Foundation (Grant No. 0956552) and National Geographic Society (Grant No.7988-06). MEG thanks the Center for Climate and Resilience Research (CR)2 (CONICYT/FONDAP/15110009) and FONDECYT (Grant No. 1171400). IAM and JP are researchers at CONICET (National Council for Scientific and Technical Research of Argentina).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratorio de Dendrocronología e Historia Ambiental, IANIGLA-CONICET, CCT CONICET Mendoza, Av. Ruiz Leal s/n. CC330-M5502IRA Mendoza, Pcia. de Mendoza, Argentina

    Ignacio A. Mundo

  2. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales, Universidad Nacional de Cuyo, Padre Contreras 1300. M5502JMA Mendoza, Pcia. de Mendoza, Argentina

    Ignacio A. Mundo

  3. Department of Geography, Portland State University, 1721 SW Broadway, Cramer Hall Rm. 424, Portland, OR, 97201, USA

    Andrés Holz

  4. Facultad de Ciencias Forestales y Recursos Naturales, Laboratorio Ecología de Bosques, Instituto de Conservación, Biodiversidad y Territorio, Universidad Austral de Chile, Campus Isla Teja, Casilla 567, Valdivia, Chile

    Mauro E. González

  5. Laboratorio Ecotono, INIBIOMA, CONICET-Universidad Nacional del Comahue, Quintral 1250, R8400FRD, Bariloche, Río Negro, Argentina

    Juan Paritsis

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  1. Ignacio A. Mundo
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  2. Andrés Holz
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  3. Mauro E. González
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Correspondence to Ignacio A. Mundo .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Instituto de Investigaciones en Recursos, Naturales, Agroecología y Desarrollo Rural, Universidad Nacional de Río Negro, El Bolsón, Río Negro, Argentina

    Mariano M. Amoroso

  2. Department of Forest and Conservation Sciences, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

    Lori D. Daniels

  3. School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

    Patrick J. Baker

  4. Pyrenean Institute of Ecology (IPE-CSIC), Zaragoza, Spain

    J. Julio Camarero

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Mundo, I.A., Holz, A., González, M.E., Paritsis, J. (2017). Fire History and Fire Regimes Shifts in Patagonian Temperate Forests. In: Amoroso, M., Daniels, L., Baker, P., Camarero, J. (eds) Dendroecology. Ecological Studies, vol 231. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-61669-8_9

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