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Although temperate and tropical forests in total cover twice as much land as boreal forest, boreal forest contains 20% more carbon than the other two combined. [1] Boreal forests are susceptible to global warming because the ice/snow–albedo feedback is significantly influenced by surface temperature, so fire induced changes in surface albedo and infrared emissivity are more significant than ...
Fires can cause changes in soil nutrients through a variety of mechanisms, which include oxidation, volatilization, erosion, and leaching by water, but the event must usually be of high temperatures for significant loss of nutrients to occur.
The ecological theory of alternative stable states describes how different ecosystems can exist side by side, and how they can shift as a result of disturbance. Applied to fire ecology, the theory describes how flammable and less-flammable vegetation types can exist side by side, and are maintained by different relationships with fire. [3]
For example, trees evolved with fire-embracing traits can "sacrifice" themselves during fires. But they also cause fires to spread and kill their less flammable neighbors. With the help of other fire adaptive traits such as serotiny, flammable trees will occupy the gap created by fires and colonize the habitat. [20] [21]
Climate change promotes the type of weather that makes wildfires more likely. In some areas, an increase of wildfires has been attributed directly to climate change. [11]: 247 Evidence from Earth's past also shows more fire in warmer periods. [74] Climate change increases evapotranspiration. This can cause vegetation and soils to dry out.
The fires have caused widespread devastation in Lahaina, a beach resort city of about 13,000 people on northwestern Maui that was once a whaling center and the Hawaiian Kingdom's capital and now ...
Disturbance of a fire can clearly be seen by comparing the unburnt (left) and burnt (right) sides of the mountain range in South Africa. The veld ecosystem relies on periodic fire disturbances like these to rejuvenate itself. In ecology, a disturbance is a temporary change in environmental conditions that causes a pronounced change in an ecosystem.
What causes earthquakes? Earthquakes occur when the plates that make up the Earth's crust move around. These plates, called tectonic plates, can push against each other.