• IMMEDIATE FIRE EFFECT ON PLANT
• DISCUSSION AND QUALIFICATION OF FIRE EFFECT
• PLANT RESPONSE TO FIRE
• DISCUSSION AND QUALIFICATION OF PLANT RESPONSE
• FIRE MANAGEMENT CONSIDERATIONS

IMMEDIATE FIRE EFFECT ON PLANT:

DISCUSSION AND QUALIFICATION OF FIRE EFFECT:

PLANT RESPONSE TO FIRE:

Rocky Mountain maple also colonizes sites after fire via wind-dispersed seed [288].

DISCUSSION AND QUALIFICATION OF PLANT RESPONSE:

FIRE MANAGEMENT CONSIDERATIONS:

Prescribed fire may initially reduce the percent cover of Rocky Mountain maple substantially, though in several years it is expected to approach or surpass pretreatment coverage [285]. Percent cover of Rocky Mountain maple may increase dramatically over preburn levels within 5 years of burning, however, variable results may be expected [62].

Rocky Mountain maple may experience an increase in crown volume following disturbance, resprouting more after burning than after logging treatments [56]. Within 3 years, crown diameters of Rocky Mountain maple may be equal to or greater than diameter prior to burning [180]. However, other studies have found that 2 years after burning, Rocky Mountain maple only recovered 8% of its prefire crown volume, and proportion of total shrub volume had decreased from 80% prefire to 14% postfire [193]. Three out of 4 harvest and burning treatments in Montana were found to effectively reduce Rocky Mountain maple shrub volume, though it began increasing again after 2 years posttreatment. The 4th treatment (no burning) left more individuals intact and they subsequently demonstrated less sprouting and Rocky mountain maple experienced no dramatic decline or increase in shrub volume [274]. After prescribed burning in Idaho, Rocky Mountain maple averaged 120 sprouts per plant; fall burning produced fewer but longer sprouts than spring burning [182]. Mean heights for Rocky Mountain maple were found to be greater on logged/broadcast burned sites than on logged or logged/piled/burned sites in Idaho [233].

Prescribed burning is used to maintain seral shrubfields and provide winter range for elk by retarding conifer dominance, decreasing the height of browse plants, increasing browse quality and palatability, and stimulating forage plants to regenerate from seed [179,180,212,240,288]. However, Rocky Mountain maple quickly grows out of reach of browsing animals due to its rapid regrowth after fire [139,180,326]. Miller and others [212] found that low-temperature fires might encourage excessive growth with leaders exceeding 6.5 feet (2 m) in a single growing season. Severe burns that actually damage Rocky Mountain maple and stunt leader growth may be better utilized to reduce leader heights to a usable level of 1.6 feet (.5 m) or less. Prescribed fire effectively improves forage availability in the short-term [25,56,193,195,326,331], and has been found to reduce height of Rocky Mountain maple from 7 to 16 feet (2.1-4.9 m) before fire to less than 7 feet (2.1 m) after fire [198]. Asherin [25] found that by the end of the 3rd postfire growing season, Rocky Mountain maple height exceeded 8 feet (2.4 m). Four years after burning in Idaho shrubfields, 80% of twig production remained within reach of elk [181,182]. Repeated burns at 10 to 15 year intervals are expected to maintain Rocky Mountain maple availability [181,182,184,288]; however, it is often difficult to re-establish trees on these sites in the future [288]. Broadcast burning of clearcuts in the northern Rockies may produce these seral shrubfields [162,281,338]; in 1 study, shrub-dominant vegetation occurred by the 8th postfire year [338]. Rocky Mountain maple was present within 4 years on another lightly burned clearcut [126].

After burning, browse production may be higher than prefire production initially [56,183], but annual production was observed to taper off by the 10th year, falling below prefire browse production [183]. Both spring and fall burning appear to increase Rocky Mountain maple palatability, based on heavy use in burned areas and browsing of larger twigs [180]. Crude protein levels may be higher in Rocky Mountain maple for up to 4 years following fire [240].

Related categories for SPECIES: Acer glabrum | Rocky Mountain Maple