RAPID: Successive Wildfire Influence on Forested Depressional Wetlands in Southern Florida

佛罗里达大柏树国家保护区的湿地马赛克景观中的野火提供了一个突然和时间紧迫的机会，以了解当干旱和火灾连续发生时，森林湿地会发生什么。在这种情况下，一个在2009年严重干旱期间经历野火的地区在四年后（2013年3月）再次燃烧，并且在区域干旱条件下也是如此。2009年野火后的一系列研究提供了2013年前的大量火灾数据，从湿地火灾的角度来看，这一机会非常不寻常。通过测量火灾严重程度、树木死亡率和土壤流失，该项目将提供关于湿地对火灾和干旱的恢复能力的重要信息。 柏树圆顶将水储存到该地区每年的旱季。因此，它们为野生动物提供了重要的栖息地;集中猎物生物的避难所;以及为供应佛罗里达西南部不断增长的人口的浅层含水层提供补给盆地的分布式网络。预计的气候变化和人类改变的水文相结合，可能导致更频繁和更严重的野火。通过了解干旱和反复发生的野火对这些湿地马赛克景观的综合影响，该项目有望为火灾管理战略提供信息。

A wildfire in the wetland-mosaic landscape of Big Cypress National Preserve, Florida, offers a sudden and time-critical opportunity to understand what happens to forested wetlands when drought and fire occur in quick succession. In this instance, an area that experienced wildfire during severe drought in 2009 burned again only four years later (March 2013) and also during regional drought conditions. A series of studies after the 2009 wildfire provide considerable pre-2013 fire data, making this opportunity highly unusual from the standpoint of fires in wetlands. By making measurements of fire severity, tree mortality and loss of soil, this project will provide critical information on the resilience of wetlands to fire and drought. Cypress domes store water long into the region's annual dry season. They thus provide important habitat for wildlife; refugia that concentrate prey organisms; and a distributed network of recharge basins for the shallow aquifer that supplies southwestern Florida's growing human population. The combination of projected climate change and human-altered hydrology is likely to result in more frequent and severe wildfires. By understanding the combined effects of drought and repeated wildfires on these wetland-mosaic landscapes, the project is expected to inform fire management strategies.