Melina Deluchi Mondschein
My project arises due to the problems caused by fires, with the aim of designing tools associated with the management and restoration of post-fire sites. It is being developed in the northern Patagonia region of Argentina, where fire is a disturbance that significantly affects the development of plant communities and the structure and composition of current landscapes. According to preliminary studies, resprouting species are key in the regeneration and restoration of these new landscapes. Therefore, this characteristic was taken into account when selecting the species to study: Nothofagus antarctica, Schinus patagonicus, Maytenus boaria, and Ochetophila trinervis, all native to the study region. To study them, the disciplines of fire ecology and plant architecture will be taken as the basis, the latter allowing for a dynamic and global analysis of plant growth and development, describing the development sequence of a species under non-limiting conditions, and then analysing variations under different environmental pressures. The post-fire responses of these species will be studied based on architectural traits, evaluating possible changes in the combustibility and flammability of the individuals and communities studied.
Transplantation of Maytenus boaria plant. ©Branko Zuñiga.
The main objectives are:
1. In plants between 2 and 3 years old, of the selected species growing in nursery conditions, describe the basic architecture of their early development sequence.
2. Experimentally study, in nursery plants of the same species subjected to controlled burns, their post-fire responses and architectural variations.
3. In juvenile-adult plants of the selected species growing in natural field conditions, analyse: in plants not affected by fire, their basic architecture, and in plants affected by fire, the post-fire response, its relationship with structural flammability, and variations in architectural patterns at different levels of plant organisation.
4. Analyse post-pruning responses and architectural variations in 45 individuals of Nothofagus antarctica, growing in a natural environment affected by fire in the last 2-3 years, which were previously subjected to different pruning treatments.
Header: Nothofagus antárctica tree affected by a fire. The burnt trunk and green shoots emerging from the base are visible. ©Branko Zuñiga.