BIO205H5 Lecture Notes - Lecture 20: Fire Regime, Biome, First Nations
Document Summary
Communities change over time, which is called succession. We can describe changes by dividing the process into serial stages. Knowing about succession allows us to identify the mechanisms at play, understand the current community and predict future changes. Vancouver island lies in the temperate rainforest biome. Temperatures never go below freezing and summers are nice and warm. Trees and plants can grow throughout the year. Vancouver discovered by european settlers - european settlement changed the environment. Main difference was management of fire - fire was a standard tool to shape their surroundings. Europeans didn"t need fires and suppressed them completely. Hypothesis - existence of fire-resistant trees has decreased since the european settlement. If hypothesis is correct - we will see more fire-resistant trees in pre-european times and fewer today. Now there is no need for fire-resistant trees because fire is not used as predominantly as it used to be.
