Abstract
Records of forest fire disturbance are relatively short (~50-100 years) in many regions across the southeastern United States. For much of the southeast, the historical fire records only cover approximately the past 50 years. Therefore, there is a need to develop proxy records of fire history to better understand the natural variability of fire regimes. This research will attempt to develop proxy fire histories using bog sediment records collected in Western North Carolina in the Southern Appalachian Mountains. Identifying connections between historic fire and climate patterns may help determine how ecosystems have responded to past changes in climate so that this information can be used to improve land-use and forest management plans in the future. Records of fire activity were determined by analyzing sedimentary macroscopic (>125 μm) charcoal preserved in the sediments of the Panthertown Valley Wetland Complex in Sapphire, NC. The sediment records were dated using 14C dating at Woods Hole - National Ocean Sciences Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (NOSAMS) facility, in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. Analysis of the region’s fire history will inform decision makers about the management of forest resources and guide the use of prescribed fire as a management tool in the region.
How to Cite
Miller, A., (2018) “Fire-Regime Management in Western North Carolina”, Capstone, The UNC Asheville Journal of Undergraduate Scholarship 31(2), 5/1/2019.
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