Arctic tundra fires: Natural variability and responses to climate change

Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment

Volumn 13, Issue 7, 2015, Pages 369-377

  Hu, Feng Sheng ^a,b   Higuera, Philip E ^c   Duffy, Paul ^d   Chipman, Melissa L ^a   Rocha, Adrian V ^e   Young, Adam M ^f   Kelly, Ryan ^g,h   Dietze, Michael C ^h  

^a UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA CHAMPAIGN   (United States)

^b ILLINOIS STATE GEOLOGICAL SURVEY   (United States)

^c UNIVERSITY OF MONTANA   (United States)

^d Neptune and Company   (United States)

^e UNIVERSITY OF NOTRE DAME   (United States)

^f UNIVERSITY OF IDAHO   (United States)

^g DUKE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^h BOSTON UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ANTHROPOGENIC EFFECT; BIOGEOCHEMICAL CYCLE; BIOPHYSICS; CHARCOAL; CLIMATE CHANGE; FIRE MANAGEMENT; POLICY MAKING; SOCIOECONOMIC IMPACT; TUNDRA; TWENTY FIRST CENTURY;

ALASKA; ARCTIC; UNITED STATES;

EID: 84943772938     PISSN: 15409295     EISSN: 15409309     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1890/150063     Document Type: Review

References (57)

1. AICC (Alaska Interagency Coordination Center). 2014. http://fire.ak.blm.gov. Viewed 7 Feb 2014.
2. Ault TR, Cole JE, and St George S. 2012. The amplitude of decadal to multidecadal variability in precipitation simulated by state-of-the-art climate models. Geophys Res Lett 39: L21705.
3. Bhatt US, Walker DA, Raynolds MK, et al. 2010. Circumpolar Arctic tundra vegetation change is linked to sea ice decline. Earth Interact 14: 1-20.
4. Bowden WB. 2010. Climate change in the Arctic - permafrost, thermokarst, and why they matter to the non-Arctic world. Geography Compass 4: 1553-66.
5. Bret-Harte MS, Mack MC, Shaver GR, et al. 2013. The response of Arctic vegetation and soils following an unusually severe tundra fire. Philos T Roy Soc B 368: 20120490.
6. Brown RJE. 1983. Effects of fire on the permafrost ground thermal regime. In: Wein RW and MacLean DA (Eds). The role of fire in northern circumpolar ecosystems. New York, NY: John Wiley and Sons Ltd.
7. CAVM (Circumpolar Arctic Vegetation Map) Team. 2003. Circumpolar Arctic Vegetation Map. Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF) Map No 1. Anchorage, AK: US Fish and Wildlife Service. www.geobotany.uaf.edu/cavm. Viewed 7 Feb 2014.
8. Chambers SD, Beringer J, Randerson JT, and Chapin FS. 2005. Fire effects on net radiation and energy partitioning: contrasting responses of tundra and boreal forest ecosystems. J Geophys Res 110: D01960.
9. Chapin FS, Sturm M, Serreze MC, et al. 2005. Role of land-surface changes in Arctic summer warming. Science 310: 657-60.
10. Chipman ML, Hudspith V, Higuera PE, et al. 2015. Spatiotemporal patterns of tundra fires: late-Quaternary charcoal records from Alaska. Biogeosciences 12: 4017-27.
11. 2 release from permafrost soil carbon in the Arctic. P Natl Acad Sci USA 110: 3429-34.
12. Duffy PA, Walsh JE, Graham JM, et al. 2005. Impacts of large-scale atmospheric-ocean variability on Alaskan fire season severity. Ecol Appl 15: 1317-30.
13. Giglio L, Randerson JT, van der Werf GR, et al. 2010. Assessing variability and long-term trends in burned area by merging multiple satellite fire products. Biogeosciences 7: 1171-86.
14. Global Fire Emissions Database. 2015. GFED4 dataset. www.globalfiredata.org. Viewed 1 Jan 2015.
15. Goetz SJ, Bunn AG, Fiske GJ, and Houghton RA. 2005. Satelliteobserved photosynthetic trends across boreal North America associated with climate and fire disturbance. P Natl Acad Sci USA 102: 13521-25.
16. Gustine DD, Brinkman T, Lindgren M, et al. 2014. Climate-driven effects of fire on winter habitat for caribou in the Alaskan- Yukon Arctic. PLoS ONE 9: e112584.
17. Harris I, Jones PD, Osborn TJ, and Lister DH. 2014. Updated highresolution grids of monthly climatic observations - the CRU TS3.10 Dataset. Int J Climatol 34: 623-42.
18. Hess JC, Scott CA, Hufford GL, and Fleming MD. 2001. El Niño and its impact on fire weather conditions in Alaska. Int J Wildland Fire 10: 1-13.
19. Higuera PE, Brubaker LB, Anderson PM, et al. 2008. Frequent fires in ancient shrub tundra: implications of paleorecords for Arctic environmental change. PLoS ONE 3: e1744.
20. Higuera PE, Chipman ML, Barnes JL, et al. 2011a. Variability of tundra fire regimes in Arctic Alaska: millennial scale patterns and ecological implications. Ecol Appl 21: 3211-26.
21. Higuera PE, Barnes JL, Chipman ML, et al. 2011b. The burning tundra: A look back at the last 6000 years of fire in the Noatak National Preserve, northwestern Alaska. Alaska Park Sci 10: 36-41.
22. Hu FS, Higuera PE, Walsh JE, et al. 2010. Tundra burning in Alaska: linkages to climatic change and sea ice retreat. J Geophys Res-Biogeo 115: G04002.
23. IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change). 2013. Scenario Process for AR5. http://sedac.ipcc-data.org/ddc/ar5-scenario-process/RCPs.html Viewed 7 Feb 2014.
24. Jandt R, Joly K, Meyers CR, and Racine C. 2008. Slow recovery of lichen on burned caribou winter range in Alaska tundra: potential influences of climate warming and other disturbance factors. Arct Antarct Alp Res 40: 89-95.
25. Jiang Y, Rastetter EB, Rocha AV, et al. 2015. Modeling carbonnutrient interactions during the early recovery of tundra after fire. Ecol Appl; doi:10.1890/14-1921.1.
26. Joly K, Bente P, and Dau J. 2007. Response of overwintering caribou to burned habitat in northwest Alaska. Arctic 60: 401-10.
27. Joly K, Duffy PA, and Rupp TS. 2012. Simulating the effects of climate change on fire regimes in Arctic biomes: implications for caribou and moose habitat. Ecosphere 3: 36.
28. Jones BM, Kolden CA, Jandt R, et al. 2009. Fire behavior, weather, and burn severity of the 2007 Anaktuvuk River tundra fire, North Slope, Alaska. Arct Antarct Alp Res 41: 309-16.
29. Jones BM, Breen AL, Gaglioti BV, et al. 2013. Identification of unrecognized tundra fire events on the North Slope of Alaska. J Geophys Res-Biogeo 118: 1334-44.
30. Kaufman DS, Schneider DP, McKay NP, et al. 2009. Recent warming reverses long-term Arctic cooling. Science 4: 1236-39.
31. Landhäusser SM and Wein RW. 1993. Postfire vegetation recovery and tree establishment at the Arctic treeline: climate-changevegetation- response hypotheses. J Ecol 85: 665-72.
32. Lawrence DM, Slater AG, Tomas RA, et al. 2008. Accelerated Arctic land warming and permafrost degradation during rapid sea ice loss. Geophys Res Lett 35: L11506.
33. Liljedahl A, Hinzman L, Busey R, and Yoshikawa K. 2007. Physical short-term changes after a tussock tundra fire, Seward Peninsula, Alaska. J Geophys Res 112: 2003-12.
34. Loranty MM, Goetz SJ, and Beck PSA. 2011. The effects of tundra vegetation on pan-Arctic albedo. Environ Res Lett 6: 024014.
35. Mack MC, Bret-Harte MS, Hollingsworth TN, et al. 2011. Carbon loss from an unprecedented Arctic tundra wildfire. Nature 431: 440-43.
36. Mann DH, Groves P, Reanier RE, and Kunz ML. 2010. Floodplains, permafrost, cottonwood trees, and peat: what happened the last time climate warmed suddenly in arctic Alaska? Quaternary Sci Rev 29: 3812-30.
37. Myers-Smith IH, Forbes BC, Wilmking M, et al. 2011. Shrub expansion in tundra ecosystems: dynamics, impacts and research priorities. Environ Res Lett 6: 045509.
38. 2 exchange in the Alaskan Arctic in response to decadal climate warming. Nature 406: 978-81.
39. Racine CH, Johnson LA, and Viereck LA. 1987. Patterns of vegetation recovery after tundra fires in northwestern Alaska, USA. Arct Antarct Alp Res 19: 461-69.
40. Racine C, Jandt R, Meyers C, and Dennis J. 2004. Tundra fire and vegetation change along a hillslope on the Seward Peninsula, Alaska, USA. Arct Antarct Alp Res 36: 1-10.
41. Riordan B, Verbyla D, and McGuire AD. 2006. Shrinking ponds in subarctic Alaska based on 1950-2002 remotely sensed images. J Geophys Res 11: G04002.
42. 2 exchange in Arctic tundra. Ecol Appl 21: 477-89.
43. Rocha AV and Shaver GR. 2011b. Post-fire energy exchange in Arctic tundra: The importance and climatic implications of burn severity. Glob Change Biol 17: 2831-41.
44. Rocha AV, Loranty MM, Higuera PE, et al. 2012. The footprint of Alaskan tundra fires during the past half-century: implications for surface properties and radiative forcing. Environ Res Lett 7: 044039.
45. Romps DM, Seeley JT, Vollaro D, and Mollinari J. 2014. Projected increase in lightning strikes in the United States due to global warming. Science 346: 851-54.
46. Schuur EAG, Vogel JG, Crummer KG, et al. 2009. The effect of permafrost thaw on old carbon release and net carbon exchange from tundra. Nature 459: 556-59.
47. Sitch S, Mcguire AD, Kimball J, et al. 2007. Assessing the carbon balance of circumpolar Arctic tundra using remote sensing and process modeling. Ecol Appl 17: 213-34.
48. Smith LC, Sheng Y, MacDonald GM, and Hinzman LD. 2005. Disappearing Arctic lakes. Science 308: 1429-29.
49. SNAP (Scenarios Network for Alaska and Arctic Planning). 2014. "Historical Monthly Temperature and Precipitation - 771 m CRU TS 3.1/3.1.01" and "Projected Monthly Temperature and Precipitation - 2 km CMIP5/AR5". www.snap.uaf.edu/tools/data-downloads. Viewed 26 Jun 2015.
50. Swann AL, Fung IY, Levis S, et al. 2010. Changes in Arctic vegetation induce high-latitude warming through the greenhouse effect. P Natl Acad Sci USA 107: 1295-300.
51. Vors LS and Boyce MS. 2009. Global declines of caribou and reindeer. Glob Change Biol 15: 2626-33.
52. Walker DA, Raynolds MK, Daniels FJA, et al. 2005. The circumpolar Arctic vegetation map. J Veg Sci 16: 267-82.
53. Walsh JE, Chapman WL, Romanovsky V, et al. 2008. Global climate model performance over Alaska and Greenland. J Climate 21: 6156-74.
54. Wang M and Overland JE. 2012. A sea ice free summer Arctic within 30 years: An update from CMIP5 models. Geophys Res Lett 39: L18501.
55. Wein RW. 1976. Frequency and characteristics of Arctic tundra fires. Arctic 29: 213-22.
56. Williams JW, Jackson ST, and Kutzbach JE. 2007. Projected distributions of novel and disappearing climates by 2100 AD. P Natl Acad Sci USA 104: 5738-42.
57. Zimov SA, Davydov SP, Zimova GM, et al. 2006. Permafrost carbon: stock and decomposability of a globally significant carbon pool. Geophys Res Lett 33: L20502.