Impact of fire return interval on pyrogenic carbon stocks in a tropical savanna, North Queensland, Australia

Jordahna Haig; Jonathan Sanderman; Costijn Zwart; Colleen Smith; Michael I. Bird

doi:10.1071/WF24006

RESEARCH ARTICLE (Open Access)

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Impact of fire return interval on pyrogenic carbon stocks in a tropical savanna, North Queensland, Australia

Jordahna Haig

^A ^C , Jonathan Sanderman

^B , Costijn Zwart

^A ^C , Colleen Smith

^B and Michael I. Bird

^A ^C ^*

+ Author Affiliations

- Author Affiliations

^A College of Science and Engineering and ARC Centre of Excellence for Indigenous and Environmental Histories and Futures, James Cook University, Cairns, Qld 4870, Australia.

^B Woodwell Climate Research Center, 149 Woods Hole Road, Falmouth, MA 02540, USA.

^C College of Science and Engineering and ARC Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, James Cook University, Cairns, Qld 4870, Australia.

^* Correspondence to: michael.bird@jcu.edu.au

International Journal of Wildland Fire 33, WF24006 https://doi.org/10.1071/WF24006

Submitted: 13 January 2024 Accepted: 20 July 2024 Published: 15 August 2024

© 2024 The Author(s) (or their employer(s)). Published by CSIRO Publishing on behalf of IAWF. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND)

Abstract

Background

Indigenous fire management in northern Australian savannas (beginning at least 11,000 years ago) involved frequent, small, cool, early dry season fires. This fire regime changed after European arrival in the late 1700s to unmanaged fires that burn larger areas, late in the dry season, detrimental to carbon stocks and biodiversity.

Aims

Test the hypothesis that significant sequestration of pyrogenic carbon in soil accompanies the reimposition of an Indigenous fire regime.

Methods

Savanna soils under the same vegetation, but with the number of fires varying from 0 to 13 (irrespective of the season) between 2000 and 2022 were sampled. Organic and pyrogenic carbon stocks as well as carbon isotope composition of the 0–5 cm soil layer were determined along sample transects with varying fire return intervals.

Key results

An average increase of 0.25 MgC ha⁻¹ was observed in soil pyrogenic carbon stocks in transects with ≥5 fires, compared to transects with 0–4 fires, with a small increase in soil organic carbon stocks that was not significant.

Conclusions

A return to more frequent fires early in the dry season has the potential to sequester significant pyrogenic carbon in northern Australian savanna soils on decadal timescales.

Keywords: biomass burning, carbon isotope, carbon sequestration, hydrogen pyrolysis, Indigenous fire management, northern Australia, pyrogenic carbon, tropical savanna.

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