Issue Date
1982-11-01Keywords
annual grasslandsFire Retardant
diammonium phosphate
DAP
drop
range readiness
wildfire
San Joaquin Experimental Range
phosphorus
responses
precipitation
soil moisture
composition
forbs
nitrogen
grasses
species composition
California
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Larson, J. R., & Duncan, D. A. (1982). Annual grassland response to fire retardant and wildfire. Journal of Range Management, 35(6), 700-703.Publisher
Society for Range ManagementJournal
Journal of Range ManagementDOI
10.2307/3898242Additional Links
https://rangelands.org/Abstract
Diammonium phosphate (DAP), air-dropped in early autumn 1974 to contain a wildfire on the San Joaquin Experimental Range in California, applied high levels of nitrogen and phosphorus to foothill annual grassland. The DAP drop and fire provided 4 treatments for the study-unburned + DAP, burned + DAP, burned and unburned (control). In the first year both of the DAP treatments, with yields of more than 12,000 kg/ha produced twice that of the unburned (control). First-year forage yields for the unburned and burned plots were not significantly different. The second year the burned plot yielded almost twice that of the unburned. The second year, the unburned + DAP plot produced about 4200 kg/ha, the highest yield of all 4 plots, and significantly higher than the burned + DAP plots. Annual and seasonal weather patterns and soil moisture affected herbage composition more than treatments. Although forbs usually increase in annual grassland after fire, and nitrogen fertilizer favors grasses, grasses nonetheless dominated on all 4 treatments in the first year. Forbs were dominant the second year. The difference in relative percent composition of grasses and forbs was greater between years than between treatments.Type
textArticle
Language
enISSN
0022-409Xae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.2307/3898242