The ‘Bright’ Side of Brushfires

Fires can have massive impacts in nature, to the point of eradicating all plant and animal life in an area. However, even though they often result in loss of wildlife, they also present an opportunity for biologists to learn more about how organisms respond to the fire. For example, while most plants are better off without fires, some plants have adapted to flourish after fires, taking immediate advantage of the cleared landscape. Fires allow us to see features of organisms that we can’t observe regularly, revealing a whole different side of them. Since plants put energy into developing these adaptations, essentially storing resources in case of a possible future disturbance, learning about organisms’ responses to fires can also help explain their regular behavior.

That’s why even though the brushfire that happened at the Bernard Field Station initially caused panic and phone calls from worried parents, it became exciting news for biologists. It’s been more than 2 years since the fire (it happened in September 2013) and you can still tell which parts were burnt, from the remnants of ash covered trees and differences in vegetation. For this experiment I decided to look at whether the fire had a positive impact on the abundance of Eriodictyon californicum, more commonly known as yerba santa, which has been observed to flourish right after fires (Biswell).

Eriodictyon californicum (yerba santa)

In order to do this I randomly generated 10 points on a map from the burnt and unburned regions of the field station, and then visited them using GPS coordinates to count the number of plants. While this method allowed me to reduce my bias by truly randomizing the locations where I will be taking readings from, it also required me to navigate my way through thick layers of vegetation to get to arbitrary locations. Moving from location to location was perhaps the most difficult part of this experiment because the vegetation was often too thick for me to pass through, and I had to a bunch of detours to get to my destination. As a result of this, by the end of the experiment, all of my clothes and equipment smelled like Artemisia californica, also known as the California sagebrush, which is a fragrant plant that is found in abundance in the field station.

For my counting procedure I had decided that I’d count the number of yerba santa plants within a 5x5m area at each location. In order to do this I carried around 4 bamboo stakes with accompanying 5m long strings, and set up quadrats one by one at each location. This process was also kind of tedious as I had to first tie the strings to the stakes, place them at 5m distances, and then individually roll up each string in order to prevent them from tangling after I was done with counting. Even though the process felt slow and laborious at first, I got better at it over time, and could rapidly set up and take down the quadrats. In addition, I also found the bamboo stakes to be pretty useful in navigating through bushes, by using them to hold or clear the branches that were in my way.

Navigating through the burnt region was generally much easier as the vegetation wasn’t as dense, but I still had to be careful about not interfering with other people’s experiments. The field station is used by many students and classes by the Claremont Consortium, and people often leave little flags in areas where they are conducting experiments. While people leave these flags to make finding the spots easier in the future, it also serves as a sign for other people to be careful with not stepping on organisms and interfering with their experiments.

Flags left by other students

Even though I haven’t yet analyzed my data, the data collection procedure went as expected and I didn’t run across any major issues. Overall, the experiment was fairly enjoyable, as being out in the nature is a nice break from usual schoolwork and much more exciting than working indoors. As a bonus, I also ran into interesting wildlife other my subject organism, such as rabbits, a mystery mammal about the size of a fox (it briefly ran by me and disappeared into the vegetation), and various birds, including a large bird of prey, which I couldn’t closely examine, but resembled a golden eagle, but is much more likely to be a red-tailed hawk.

A view of the unburnt coastal sage scrub region.

You can see both the California sage scrub which occupies the foreground

and the Yerba santa which are slightly taller and have darker leaves in this picture. 

A field of yerba santa plants in the burnt coastal sage scrub region.

References Cited:

Biswell, Harold H. 1974. Effects of fire on chaparral. In: Kozlowski, T. T.; Ahlgren, C. E., eds.
               Fire and ecosystems. New York: Academic Press: 321-364.  [14542]