Savanna Vegetation-Fire-Climate Relationships Differ Among Continents

By C. Lehmann, T. M. Anderson, M. Sankaran, Steven Higgins, Sally Archibald, W. Hoffmann, Niall P. Hanan, Richard J. Williams, R. Fensham, J. Felfili and 12 more. Science, 2014

628 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Surveying Savannas Savannas are structurally similar across the three major continents where they occur, leading to the assumption that the factors controlling vegetation structure and function are broadly similar, too. Lehmann et al. (p. 548) report the results of an extensive analysis of ground-based tree abundance in savannas, sampled at more than 2000 sites in Africa, Australia, and South America. All savannas, independent of region, shared a common functional property in the way that moisture and fire regulated tree abundance. However, despite qualitative similarity in the moisture–fire–tree-biomass relationships among continents, key quantitative differences exist among the three regions, presumably as a result of unique evolutionary histories and climatic domains. Evolution cannot be overlooked when aiming to predict the potential global impacts on savanna dynamics in a warming world. Ecologists have long sought to understand the factors controlling the structure of savanna vegetation. Using data from 2154 sites in savannas across Africa, Australia, and South America, we found that increasing moisture availability drives increases in fire and tree basal area, whereas fire reduces tree basal area. However, among continents, the magnitude of these effects varied substantially, so that a single model cannot adequately represent savanna woody biomass across these regions. Historical and environmental differences drive the regional variation in the functional relationships between woody vegetation, fire, and climate. These same differences will determine the regional responses of vegetation to future climates, with implications for global carbon stocks.

Subfields: Atmospheric Science, Global and Planetary Change, Nature and Landscape Conservation

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/5a9133349248ca28a2f8334049710bdb52d5a3ad

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Citations in the corpus

Controlling invasive plant species in ecological restoration: A global review (2020, methodology): “Besides being used as a restoration tool, fire is also a management strategy to maintain fire-dependent ecosystems and species (Lehmann et al., 2014; Overbeck et al., 2013; Overbeck, Müller, Pillar, & Pfadenhauer, 2009).”
Guidelines for the application of IUCN Red List of Ecosystems categories and criteria (2015, background): “Tree and grass dynamics in savannahs across the world are influenced by fire regimes, herbivores and rainfall, although their relative roles may vary among savannah types (Lehmann et al., 2014).”
Dissecting a biodiversity hotspot: The importance of environmentally marginal habitats in the Atlantic Forest Domain of South America (2017, result): “Previous studies give support to grass coverage as a good proxy of fire frequency (Archibald et al., 2013; Hoffmann et al., 2012; Lehmann et al., 2014), although further quantification of fire regime is clearly needed (c.f. Archibald et al., 2013).”
Savanna woody encroachment is widespread across three continents (2017, positive): “Continent was included as a factor given the observed regional differences in the functional relationships between woody vegetation and climate (Lehmann et al., 2014).”
Biome Shifts and Niche Evolution in Plants (2014, background): “Until recently, biomes have mainly been studied by ecologists, climatologists, and vegetation modelers, who have puzzled over their boundaries and the processes that form and maintain them (e.g., Staver et al. 2011, Hoffmann et al. 2012, Lehmann et al. 2014).”
Revisiting the pyrodiversity–biodiversity hypothesis: long-term fire regimes and the structure of ant communities in a Neotropical savanna hotspot (2014, background): “To our knowledge, no study has explicitly tested this hypothesis in a Neotropical savanna, even though there are strong differences in the vegetation–fire–climate relationships between the cerrado savannas and the savannas of Africa and Australia (Lehmann et al. 2014).”