Small mammals and grassland fires

TitleSmall mammals and grassland fires
Publication TypeBook Chapter
Year of Publication1990
AuthorsKaufman, DW, Finck, EJ, Kaufman, GA
EditorCollins, SL, Wallace, LL
Book TitleFire in North American Tallgrass Prairies
Pagination46 -80
PublisherUniversity of Okalahoma Press
CityNorman, OK
Accession NumberKNZ00287
Keywordsfire
Abstract

For study of fire effects, the general null hypothesis is that fire will have no impact on the population density of individual animal species. Any species that fails to change numerically due to fire would be classified as a fire-neutral species. Alternatively, a population that could exhibit either a positive or negative numerical response to fire. Such species we classify as fire-positive or fire-negative species, respectively. Most early work on animals and fire was aimed at describing these general population responses. However, understanding the structure and function of grasslands demands that we know patterns of population changes from prefire through a multiyear, post-fire period, rather than simply ascertaining whether species are fire- positve, fire-negative, or fire-neutral over a short postfire period