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"Living Among The Ash: The Impacts of Wildfire on Wildlife Use Patterns on a Pinus banksiana (Jack Pine) Barrens"
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Spring 2023
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2023-04-17
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Microsoft Powerpoint XML, 11.37 MB
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"Disturbances such as wildfire, ice storms, and pest outbreaks shape forest
communities. Wildlife communities are shaped by successional trajectories that follow
disturbances in terms of resource quality, quantity, and forest structure which influences
predation risk. Our research aims to evaluate the extent to which wildfire disturbance has
altered wildlife composition over time in a unique barrens community. The Altona Flat Rock is an ~2,000 ha sandstone pavement barrens located in northern New York. Overstory at the
barrens is dominated by Pinus banksiana (Jack Pine) with an understory of primarily Vaccinium angustifolium (Lowbush Blueberry) and Gaylussacia baccata (Huckleberry). In July 2018, a wildfire burning 225 ha occurred, providing us the opportunity to study wildlife response to disturbance, and how this response changes over time as the forest recovers, regenerates, and grows - changing structural attributes and associated habitat characteristics. Using camera trapping, we monitored wildlife occurrences between the area burned in 2018 and the adjacent unburned (66 year old mature Jack Pine) forest from September 2018 (immediately following the wildfire) through 2023. Cameras were arranged to capture differences in wildlife use patterns in both the recent burn (n=2) and unburned (n=2) stands. Species-specific differences in wildlife occurrences were analyzed by year, season, and time of day. Overall wildlife species richness at the Jack Pine barrens was 31 and was greater in the burned (S=26) than the unburned (S=22) stands. The most common species were Odocoileus virginianus (White-tailed Deer) and Lepus americanus (Snowshoe Hare), and Canis latrans (Eastern Coyote). Immediately following the wildfire, wildlife occurrences were higher in the undisturbed stand; however by 2020 wildlife were using both stands equally. More recently, wildlife have again shifted away from the burned area possibly due to increasing mobility constraints caused by coarse woody debris. This study provides management guidance on wildlife habitat use patterns in response to wildfire as the barrens community recovers."