Calculating spot-fire distance in grassland vs woodland wildfires
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Woody encroachment is one of the greatest threats to grasslands globally, increasing the level of degradation to one of the world’s most at-risk ecosystems. As a system transitions from a grassland state to a woody state, rapid and persistent changes in system processes and structure occur.
Introduction
For instance, woody encroachment can alter grassland properties by shifting a system from below to above ground biomass storage, decreasing grassland species richness and diversity], altering soil carbon and nitrogen , decreasing herbaceous biomass production, and increasing demands on the water table.
Changes in fuel structure during the transition from a grassland to woodland state also shift fire regime characteristics from frequent, low flame length surface fires in grasslands to infrequent, high flame length crown fires in woodlands with recent evidence suggesting that this transition can increase large wildfire risk.
Maximum spot fire distance models
To predict spot fire behaviour, we calculated maximum spot fire distance using BehavePlus software v. 5.0.5. BehavePlus is a mathematical fire simulation program that predicts fire behaviour relative to environmental and fuel-based characteristics using a point system, where conditions are assumed uniform. It is widely used by fire managers in the U.S. to predict fire behaviour and assess wildland fuel hazards.
About the Authors
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Victoria M. Donovan
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Roles Conceptualization, Formal analysis, Methodology, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing
* E-mail: victoria.donovan@ufl.edu
Affiliations Department of Agronomy and Horticulture, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska, United States of America, School of Forest, Fisheries, and Geomatics Sciences, West Florida Research and Education Center, University of Florida, Milton, Florida, United States of America
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Dillon T. Fogarty
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Roles Data curation, Methodology, Writing – review & editing
Affiliation Department of Agronomy and Horticulture, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska, United States of America
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Dirac Twidwell
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Roles Conceptualization, Funding acquisition, Methodology, Visualization, Writing – review & editing
Affiliation Department of Agronomy and Horticulture, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska, United States of America
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2906-5268
Competing Interests
The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.