Fire-induced changes in soil and vegetation in the forest-tundra of Western Siberia

Abstract

Wildfires are one of the main factors for landscape change in tundra ecosystems. In the absence of external mechanical impacts, tundra plant communities are relatively stable, even in the face of climatic changes. In our study, lichen cover was degraded on burnt tundra sites, which increased the permafrost thaw depth from 100 to 190 cm. In old fire scars (burnt 1980 – 1990) of the forest-tundra, vegetation cover was dominated by trees and shrubs. The soil temperature on burnt forest-tundra sites was higher in comparison to conditions of the unburnt control sites and permafrost was was not found at a depth of 2-2,3m. Dynamics of the Normalized Difference Vegetation index (NDVI) from 1986-2020 reveal that immediately after fires, vegetation recovered and biomass increased due to the development of Betula nana shrubs. In old fire scars of the forest-tundra (burnt 1980-1990), a significant increase in NDVI values was evident, in contrast to the unburnt tundra vegetation where this trend was less pronounced. We conclude that "greening" in the north of Western Siberia may occur due to fire-induced transformation processes. The role of wildfires in the advance of the treeline to the north, driven by climate change and active economic development of the Arctic, will gradually increase in future.