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Weather Affects Post-Fire Recovery Of Sagebrush-Steppe Communities And Model Transferability Among Sites, Cara Applestein, T. Trevor Caughlin, Matthew J. Germino

Biology Faculty Publications and Presentations

Altered climate, including weather extremes, can cause major shifts in vegetative recovery after disturbances. Predictive models that can identify the separate and combined temporal effects of disturbance and weather on plant communities and that are transferable among sites are needed to guide vulnerability assessments and management interventions. We asked how functional group abundance responded to time since fire and antecedent weather, if long-term vegetation trajectories were better explained by initial post-fire weather conditions or by general five-year antecedent weather, and if weather effects helped predict post-fire vegetation abundances at a new site. We parameterized models using a 30- yr vegetation …