Re-establishing the historic fire regime to restore the Chittenden Meadow, Skagit Valley Provincial Park, British Columbia, Canada
Morris, Jacqueline (author) Marcoux, Hélène (thesis advisor) Cohen-Fernandez, Anayansi (thesis advisor) Cohen-Fernandez, Anayansi (chair) Chartrand, Shawn (committee member) British Columbia Institute of Technology School of Construction and the Environment (Degree granting institution) Simon Fraser University Faculty of Environmental Sciences (Degree granting institution)
Dissertation/thesis
© Jacqueline Morris, 2024. All rights reserved. No part of this work covered by the copyright hereon may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means – graphics, electronic, or mechanical including photocopying, taping, or information storage and retrieval systems – without written permission of the author.http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
British Columbia Institute of Technology
2024-01-01
44 pages
Prescribed burning is being used by BC Parks as a restoration tool to maintain the ecologically unique Chittenden Meadow in Skagit Valley Provincial Park. Forest encroachment of conifers in the meadow, due to the absence of fire, has been an ongoing issue since the 1970s. BC Parks in partnership with the BC Wildfire Branch conducted prescribed burns in April 2003 and April 2021 to reduce forest encroachment into the meadow. In 2017, BCIT students re-established a series of plots to compare vegetation community changes with the 2003-2004 prescribed burn data. This data was compared to our 2021 findings. Continued long-term monitoring of the meadow will help to enhance our understanding of vegetation community changes following prescribed fires and will build upon a decade of existing data. The historical extent of the meadow remains unclear; therefore, we conducted a broad fire history study across ~275-ha of forest surrounding the Chittenden Meadow to better understand the area's past fire frequency and severity.
prescribed burning forest encroachment vegetation community change fire history study
Ecological Restoration Program
electronic
Master of Science
