Scientists: fires help to maintain the ecology of the forest – BBC

The research team from the University of Missouri led by Michael Stambaugom found that wildfires maintain the ecosystem of the forest, and do not harm her, as previously thought. Read the conclusions of the scientists may be on the site of the University

«The forest as an ecosystem depends on fire -. To support the health of the periodic fires he simply needed – says Stambaug. – Understand how they maintain the ecosystem in the past, we can find the best ways to use fire for forest conservation in the future »

To learn the history of fires in the territory of the state of Oklahoma and Tennessee, Stambaug examined the annual rings of 332 trees from. eight different areas of each state. He found 843 various trace of burning between the rings and was able to determine when and how often each region fires have occurred in the past 300 years. He found that, despite the wet and cool climate, fires in Tennessee occurred more frequently than in Oklahoma. It also appeared that the fires occurred long before the first settlers, and therefore, for centuries represented the importance of forests

«The history of fires in America -. It is also the history of the continent’s population. People have lived here for more than 12 thousand. Years, and wherever we see the movement of people, we see the fires or the possibility of their occurrence. This situation remained unchanged for so long, that the environment was dependent on forest fires. However, in many parts of America, especially in the eastern part of the continent, fires not occurred for over 150 years due to the fact that people find ways to prevent them. Now a lot of forests suffer from a lack of necessary to update the ecosystem of fire, “- said Stambaug

For the best study of the effect of fires on the territory of America Stambaug colleagues cataloged history of fires, by studying tree rings across the country