Journal article
Bird diversity increases after patchy prescribed fire: Implications from a before-After control-impact study
H Sitters, J Di Stefano, FJ Christie, P Sunnucks, A York
International Journal of Wildland Fire | CSIRO PUBLISHING | Published : 2015
DOI: 10.1071/WF14123
Abstract
Increasingly, patchy prescribed fire of low severity is used by land managers to mitigate wildfire risk, but there are relatively few experimental studies on the effects of low-severity fire on fauna. We used a before-After control-impact experiment to examine avian responses to prescribed fire at two scales in topographically variable, tall-open eucalypt forest in south-east Australia. We surveyed birds at control and impact areas twice before and twice after fire, and applied mixed models to investigate responses of avian turnover, richness and the occurrence of selected species. Approximately half of the impact area was burnt and topographic variation generated a finger-like configuration..
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Funding Acknowledgements
This work is part of a collaborative study of the effects of fire on biodiversity in the Otway Ranges, funded by the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning and Parks Victoria. Additional funds were provided by the Holsworth Wildlife Research Endowment, the Stuart Leslie Bird Research Award and Birdlife Australia Victoria. We are grateful to Matthew Swan, Carolina Galindez Silva and Amanda Ashton for their assistance with selecting the study area, and we thank Peter Collins and Dale Tonkinson for undertaking bird surveys. We are grateful to anonymous reviewers for helpful comments on earlier drafts of the manuscript. This research was carried out under a scientific research permit issued by the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning (permit number 10005514) and approved by the University of Melbourne School of Land and Environment Ethics Committee (Register No. 1011632.5).