Fire tolerance of three tree species in pine - oak forests of Chignahuapan, Puebla, Mexico

Resprouting is a common recovery strategy of many tree and shrub species in fire-prone environments and is an important determinant of post-fire dominance and vegetation dynamics in many ecosystems. Top-kill, mortality and resprouting of the trees Quercus crassifolia, Arbutus xalapensis and Pinus teocote were studied on contiguous burned and unburned sites in the pine–oak forests of Chignahuapan, Puebla, Mexico. The study sample consisted of 375 individual trees, 199 on the burned site and 176 on the unburned site. T-tests and logistic regression were used in the statistical analysis. The number of resprouts per tree increased significantly (P 0.05) regardless of fire or lack of fire. With Q. crassifolia, top-kill and tree death were greatest in the smaller-diameter individuals. Also, the probability of top-kill was much greater than the probability of mortality; however, this difference diminished at diameters greater than 16 cm. Similarly, with A. xalapensis, there was an inverse relationship between diameter and probability of tree death.