Grasslands of the southern Great Plains have suffered a reduction in diversity due to long-term exclusion of fire from the region. An additional consequence of fire suppression has been a recent increase in the occurrence and impact of wildfires. Our study compared the effects of patch-burning to prescribed fire alone on vegetation structure and rate of biomass accumulation in the southern Great Plains. Four vegetation types are represented by four sites across Texas and Oklahoma. All sites are within the historic or current distribution of lesser (T. pallidicinctus), greater (T. cupido cupido), or Attwater�s prairie-chickens (T. c. attwateri). We measured vegetation characteristics in patches with different time-since-fire at each site in order to simulate fire behavior and assess structural characteristics relative to prairie-chicken habitat. Patch-burning maintained simulated fire intensities at or below a critical threshold of 3.4 meters for up to 36 months post-fire, compared to six months for sites treated with fire alone. Time-since-fire also impacted vegetation height and community composition, suggesting patch-burning provides for structural diversity of vegetation. Our data indicate patch-burning is a viable strategy for conservation-oriented fuels management. Implementation of patch-burning in the southern Great Plains would extend fire suppression capabilities and improve wildland firefighter safety. Patch-burning also increases heterogeneity of vegetation at the landscape scale, which is a key habitat requirement of prairie-chickens. Moreover, because of the diverse habitat requirements of prairie-chickens, patch-burning would likely benefit other Great Plains species.
Oral presentation and poster titles, abstracts, and authors from the Society for Range Management (SRM) Annual Meetings and Tradeshows, from 2013 forward.