Western spruce budworm outbreaks did not increase fire risk over the last three centuries: a dendrochronological analysis of inter-disturbance synergism.

ABSTRACT: Insect outbreaks are often assumed to increase the severity or probability of fire occurrence through increased fuel availability, while fires may in turn alter susceptibility of forests to subsequent insect outbreaks through changes in the spatial distribution of suitable host trees. However, little is actually known about the potential synergisms between these natural disturbances. Assessing inter-disturbance synergism is challenging due to the short length of historical records and the confounding influences of land use and climate changes on natural disturbance dynamics. We used dendrochronological methods to reconstruct defoliator outbreaks and fire occurrence at ten sites along a longitudinal transect running from central Oregon to western Montana. We assessed synergism between distu

SUBMITTER: Flower A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4272271 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature