Fire-Dependent Forests in the Northern Rocky Mountains
- 1 October 1973
- journal article
- Published by Cambridge University Press (CUP) in Quaternary Research
- Vol. 3 (3), 408-424
- https://doi.org/10.1016/0033-5894(73)90006-9
Abstract
One objective of wilderness and parkland fire-ecology research is to describe the relationships between fire and unmanaged ecosystems, so that strategies can be determined that will provide a more nearly natural incidence of fire. More than 50 yr of efforts directed toward exclusion of wildland fires in the Northern Rocky Mountains (western Montana and northern Idaho) have resulted in a definite and observable impact on the forest ecosystems in this region. Fire-ecology investigations in Glacier National Park and the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness have helped to reveal the nature of this impact and to provide a better understanding of the natural role of fire within these coniferous ecosystems. Such areas provide a unique opportunity to study and test approaches designed to perpetuate unmodified ecosystems. However, we still don't understand all of the long-term consequences of fire control in those forest communities that have evolved fire-dependent characteristics.Keywords
This publication has 16 references indexed in Scilit:
- Ecology of Alpine Larch (Larix lyallii Parl.) in the Pacific NorthwestEcological Monographs, 1972
- Forest Fuel Accumulation—A Growing ProblemScience, 1972
- Wildland Fires and Ecosystems‐‐A HypothesisEcology, 1970
- The Strategy of Ecosystem DevelopmentScience, 1969
- Structure, Production and Diversity of the Oak-Pine Forest at Brookhaven, New YorkJournal of Ecology, 1969
- Regulation in Terrestrial Ecosystems, and the Implied Balance of NatureThe American Naturalist, 1967
- Energy Storage and the Balance of Producers and Decomposers in Ecological SystemsEcology, 1963
- Ecological effects of forest firesThe Botanical Review, 1960
- FIRE AND SPRUCEThe Forestry Chronicle, 1950
- The Trophic‐Dynamic Aspect of EcologyEcology, 1942