Collaborative Research: Fire and Vegetation Heterogeneity in Time and Space

生态系统管理需要了解森林火灾的生态影响如何与更缓慢、更微妙的过程（如演替和土壤发育）相互作用，以产生大规模的植被模式。研究这些相互作用需要一个长期的视角，因为结果会在几个世纪内显现出来，并受到气候变化的影响。 该项目的主要目标是完善古生态学方法，以记录在过去1000年中，在威斯康星州西北部45万公顷的砂平原上的一个网站网络中的火灾和植被的空间格局的变化。该项目将为生态研究和管理目标提供视角，并将使两所州立大学和一所文科学院的学生参与跨学科的教育体验。研究结果将与威斯康星州自然资源部和契夸梅贡-尼科莱国家森林公园分享，他们正在恢复生态系统过程和结构，以保护沙区的稀有物种和群落。

Ecosystem management requires understanding how the ecological effects of forest fire interact with slower, more subtle processes such as succession and soil development to generate landscape-scale vegetation patterns. A long time perspective is required to study these interactions because the results manifest themselves over centuries, and are affected by climate variability. The primary objective of this project is to refine paleoecological methods to document changes in spatial patterns of fire and vegetation over the last 1000 years in a network of sites across a 450,000 ha sand plain in northwestern Wisconsin. The project will provide perspective for ecological studies and management goals and will involve students at two state universities and one liberal arts college in an interdisciplinary educational experience. Results will be shared with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest, who are restoring ecosystem processes and structure to protect rare species and communities on the sand plain.