George wrote:
wrote in message
ups.com...
1) Fire was never common or widespread over large areas in the
Eastern US the way it is in some other parts of the world.
Succession was more often set back by beaver and ice storms.

Well, you might want to check on those Amerinds. They saw the value of a
meadow in feeding large ungulates which fed them.

Indeed. But those were small localized fires. Drought is rare
in the East. Shade from the canopy kept temperatures on the
forest floor humidity high and suppressed understory growth
so that dead wood on the ground went from green timber to a
sopping wet sponge usually without passing through a stage of
ydryness that would promote fire.

An area recently denuded by an ice storm would allow the sun in
to dry the fallen wood and allow the understory to grow


You must have gone to other places in the uplands than I. There the
combination of latitude and altitude gave a boreal forest. Or peat bogs,
which is pretty acid.

Yes, it would take a lot of potash to neutralize a peat bog.

Don't know where the uplands are, but have spent a fair bit of time
in New England. The conifers there are mostly at the highest
elevations, while down near the lakes decidious trees are more common.
Deciduous trees also seem to be faster to colonize open space.
Almost of the wooded land East of the Mississippi is second growth
dating back to the early 20th century.

Were it not for silviculture, there would be a LOT fewer conifers in
the Eastern US.

I'm not clear on where the uplands are.

--

FF