Fire–vegetation feedbacks and alternative stable states
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The relationships between fire, vegetation, and climate create what is known as a fire regime. Within a fire regime, fire ecologists study the relationship between diverse ecosystems and fire; not only how fire affects vegetation, but also how vegetation affects the behavior of fire. The study of neighboring vegetation types that may be highly flammable and less flammable has provided insight into how these vegetation types can exist side by side, and are maintained by the presence or absence of fire events.[1] Ecologists have studied these boundaries between different vegetation types, such as a closed canopy forest and a grassland, and hypothesized about how climate and soil fertility create these boundaries in vegetation types.[1] Research in the field of pyrogeography shows how fire also plays an important role in the maintenance of dominant vegetation types, and how different vegetation types with distinct relationships to fire can exist side by side in the same climate conditions.[2] These relationships can be described in conceptual models called fire–vegetation feedbacks, and alternative stable states.
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