Abstract

AVILA-FLORES, Diana Y. et al. Effect of the severity of fire in the structure characteristics of conifer forest stands. Rev. Chapingo ser. cienc. for. ambient [online]. 2014, vol.20, n.1, pp.34-45. ISSN 2007-4018.  https://doi.org/10.5154/r.rchscfa.2013.01.005.

In order to know to what extent the severity of a fire modifies the structural parameters of a stand, the objective of this research was to conduct an exploratory analysis of the spatial distribution of trees present in mixed conifer stands of the Sierra Madre Oriental, affected by fire during the summer of 1998. The selected area consisted of three mixed conifer stands with three different fire severity levels (low, medium and high). We analyzed the distribution patterns of trees through the Ripley's K function; likewise, we analyzed the spatial interaction of trees in relation to their size and species through a mark correlation function (MCF) k_mm(r) . It was observed that according to an increasing fire severity, the spatial distribution of trees tend to aggregate and to maintained the formation of stands dimensionally heterogeneous, however tree species composition was no affected significantly. The influence of fire in these forests was observed as a promoter of dimensional diversity, although spatial mixing of species had a tendency to homogeneity.

Keywords : K function; forest structure; forest fires; spatial interaction.