Ontario

Jn a

RedOak Stand in the BancroftDistrict,

Forest Research Information Paper No. 119

A history of fire, disturbance, and growth in a red oak stand in the Bancroft District, Ontario

A report prepared for the Ontario Forest Research Institute Silviculture Program by Dr. Richard Guyette University of Missouri 1-30 Agriculture Bldg. Columbia MO 65211 USA and Dr. Dan Dey Ontario Forest Research Institute Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario Canada

Ontario Forest Research Institute 1235 Queen Street East P.O. Box 969 Sault Ste. Marie, P6A 5N5

Ontario

Ontario (_ Ontario

Natural Ministryof Resources

Research Forest Institute OFRI * IRFO

Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data Guyette, Richard A history of fire, disturbance, and growth in a red oak stand in the Bancroft district, Ontario (Forest research information paper, ISSN O319-9118 ; 119) Issued by Ontario Forest Research Institute. ISBN 0-7778-3686-6 1. Red Oak--Ontario--Bancroft Region. I. Dey, D. (Dan) II. Ontario Ministry of Naturat Resources. IlL Ontario Forest Research institute. IV. Title. V. Series. SD397.012G89

1995

634.9'7217

© 1995, Queen's Printer for Ontario Printed in Ontario, Canada Single copies of this publication are available at no charge from the address noted below. Bulk orders may involve charges. Ministry of Natural Resources Ontario Forest Research Institute P.O. Box 969 1235 Queen St. East Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario P6A 5N5 Telephone: (705) 946-2981 Fax: (705) 946-2030 Cette publication seientifique n'est d_sponible qu'en anglais.

C95-954015-0

INTRODUCTION Disturbanceisintegralto the regenerationand

logging has become an important disturbance fac-

growth of northern red oak (Quercusrubra L) in

tot while fire has become lessimportant because of

Ontario, and historicallyfire has favoured red oak

suppressionefforts,which began in the 1920s in On-

regeneration (Lorimer 1985, 1989, 1993; Abrams

tario (Cwynar 1977, MacKay1978, Lynham 1985).

1992; Abrams and Nowacki 1992; Johnson 1993;

In this report, we examine the occurrence of fire,

Van Lear and Wait 1993). In the pre-suppression

and the effectsoffireand climateonthe growthand

era, fire was an important disturbance event that

regeneration of northern red oak in central Ontario.

affected forestsuccession and regeneration in On-

Oak and red pine (Pious resinosa Ait.) stem cross-

tario (Cwynar 1977, 1978; Lynham 1985), and

sections taken near the ground were used to deter-

many firesburned annually overlarge areas {Howe

mine:1) the dates of firescars, 2) serialvariations in

and White 1913; Cwynar 1977, 1978; MacKay

growth,3) periods of regeneration, and 4) the dates

1978; Ward and Tithecott 1993). More recently,

ofgrowth release and suppression.

METHODS Thestudytreeswerelocatedon a two-hasite

ash (FraxinusamericanaL.) and basswood( Tilia

nearBarry'sBay,Ontario(Figure1). Thesample

americanaL.)comprisedonty19%ofthebasalarea,

treesgrewin anuplandoakforeston fiatto sloping

but a majority of thesetreeswere greaterthan 20

terrain (0 to 35%slope). Thesitewas somewhat

cm in dbh. Therewerealsominorcomponentsof

pyrogenic,with fine fuels(e.g.hardwoodleaflitter,

black cherry (PrunusserotinaEhrh.),white pine

grassesand forbs),a southwesternaspect,and a

(PinusstrobusL.), beech(FagusgrandifoliaEhrh.)

positionat thetopof along,slopinghillside(Figure

and hemlock[Tsugacanadensis(L.) Cart.) in the

2). The oldestoaksampledwas179yearsold.and

overstorey.

theyoungestwas68. Tables1and2 summarize the characteristics of the studysite,the standand the treesusedin the dendrochronologyanalyses.Red oak comprised39% of the stand'sbasalareaand

A singlecross-section (takenapproximately 15 to 30 cm abovethe ground)from eachof 22 northern red oak and one red pine were usedto collectgrowthandfire scardata. Twochronologies

waspresentprimarily in theoverstorey.Sugarma-

for redoakgrowthwereconstructed fromring-width

pie (AcersaccharumMarsh.)wasthe mostnumerous treespecieson the site,but 88% of themaples

measurements madeon onegrowthradius(ground

were less than 20 cm in dbh. Sugar maple dotalnated the understorey with other species such as ironwood(OslryavirEiniana(Mill.)K. Koch} White

level)for each of the 22 trees. Series of ring-width measurements were cross-matched and checked throughCOFECHA.a tree-ringanalysisprogramthat m

[]

Figure 1. Locutionof the studysitenearBarry'sBay,Ontario.

\ matches ring-width series, to ensure the absolute

thatbestreflectsthe growth _endofthe standdueto

dating of each of the 2461 annual rings(Holmeset

climate and tree biology and 2) a residual chronol-

al. 1986). Belween-tree ring-width correlations

ogy (Figure 4) that uses auto-regressivemodelling

ranged from0.59 to 0.86. Curveswere fittedto the

to maximizethe annual climatesignal in the ring-

raw ring-widthseriesto minimizering-widthvariance

width data. The chronologies were developed us-

due to nonclimatiefactorssuch as release, suppres-

ingARSTAN,a standardizalionand chronology-con-

sion and treesize. Tworing-widthchronologieswere constructed: i) a standard chronology (Figure3]

s_ction program (Cook and Holmes1984).

I

Figure 2. Representativephotographs of the upland oak study site, showing typical stand and site characteristics.

I

Table 1. Siteand treecharacteristics for norlhernred oak sampledin this study. Variable

N

Minimum

Maximum

Mean

StdDev

Aspect(degrees)

22

0

340

226

87.9

Diameter(cm)

21

18.5

66.7

37.4

12.23

2.3

5.4

3.6

0.7

Growth(mm/dia/year) 21

Table 2. Characteristics of the studystand.

Species

BasalArea' (mVha)

TreesPerHa *

AverageDbh(cm)

SugarMaple

10.22

675.4

10.6± 8.9

WhiteAsh

2.35

48.1

22.6± 10.5

WhitePine

0.49

1.2

67.5

Beech

0.40

20.6

12.4± 10.1

Total

31.51

1095.9

22.3

Fortrees > 2.5 cm in dbh.

D

Figure 3. A standardring-widthindexderivedfrom 22 redoak trees,whichmaximizesthe biological responseof the stand,includingshort-termautocorrelatedgrowthtrends.An indexvalueof 1.0 representsthe averagering-widthgrowthfor red oak in thisstudy.

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