FIRE EFFECTS
SPECIES: Acer spicatum | Mountain Maple 



IMMEDIATE FIRE EFFECT ON PLANT : 
Mountain maple is girdled at the root collar by low-severity, surface
fires, and is killed by severe fires [12].


DISCUSSION AND QUALIFICATION OF FIRE EFFECT : 
NO-ENTRY


PLANT RESPONSE TO FIRE : 
Top-killed mountain maple sprouts from underground stems or from the
root-collar [7,12].  Growth rates of 12 to 30 inches (0.3-0.75 m) for
the first postfire growing season have been reported [12].  Krefting and
others [31], however, found that burning individual plants did not
increase the amount of regrowth compared with unburned controls.
Mountain maple seedling establishment is not enhanced by bare mineral
soil [52].

In eastern North America, coastal fir forests can be replaced by
shrublands of speckled alder and mountain maple after fire, particularly
on fertile soils [18].  Mountain maple also invades pine forest sites
that have been repeatedly burned [23].

Spring fires appear to have little effect on cover of mountain maple; it
neither increases nor decreases.  During the first summer after the
Little Sioux Burn (which occurred in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area in
May), mountain maple was abundant, with a varying distribution, but it
was also abundant in areas that did not burn [6].  Tall shrub density
fluctuated in following years, but by 1975 was generally lower than in
1971 [44].  A prescribed fire in aspen-mixed hardwood in Minnesota
resulted in a decline in the amount of mountain maple [49].

Postfire succession in spruce-fir will usually not include mountain
maple until the pioneering birch and aspen trees become decadent, 50 or
more years after fire [13].


DISCUSSION AND QUALIFICATION OF PLANT RESPONSE : 
NO-ENTRY


FIRE MANAGEMENT CONSIDERATIONS : 
NO-ENTRY

Related categories for Species: Acer spicatum | Mountain Maple