Fig. 2
From: Fire regimes of the Southern Appalachians may radically shift under climate change
The relationship within the model between fire variables (the index of fine fuel mass, fire weather index (accounting for fuel moisture), and effective windspeed) and modeled fire spread. a The intercellular fire spread probability as a function of the index of fine fuel mass and fire weather index. Colored lines represent different fine fuel indices (10th percentile, median, 90th percentile). b The maximum daily rate of spread (ha) as a function of effective daily wind speed. The model probabilistically calculates the likelihood of intercellular spread based on cellular conditions but is capped daily by the maximum daily rate of spread. In this study, we used the LANDIS-II model to simulate the Southern Appalachians, USA, under four CMIP5 climate scenarios representing increased drought trend, increased drought variability, their combination, and a scenario with neither increase. These simulations were compared to the historical climate and each other to understand changes in fire patterns and landscape-scale changes in species composition and biomass