Variation of Plant Functional Groups in Relation to Fire in Semi-Steppe Rangelands of Chaharmahal Va Bakhtiari Province

Understanding of how plants respond to a fire is essential to predict the characteristics and distribution of many ecosystems. This research is aimed at identifying, classifying and analyzing plant functional traits that can be used as a means for determining changes in plant communities through the fire at various time intervals.

The present study was conducted in the Karsanak region in Chaharmahal Va Bakhtiari province. Six sites with one and five years after the last fire were selected. A stratified random sampling was used. In each plot, after identifying the existing species, the percentage of the cover of each species was estimated and the plant characteristics were measured.

The results showed that vegetative traits such as plant height, production, SLA leaf area index, leaf area and leaf dry weight, composition of Gramineae species, herbaceous plants and shrub, the percentage of plants with class of II and III palatability, percentage of species composition with form of Hemicryptophyte and chamaephyte had a significant difference in fire and control areas. According to Principal Component Analysis, the most effective of trait were SLA leaf area index, palatability of class II, the leaf length, Hemicryptophytes, forbs and long of the leaf which had a direct relationship with five-year fire and one year fire.

Therefore, it can be concluded that plant traits play an important role in determining the response of plant species to environmental disturbances and hence can influence the process of the post-fire rangeland secondary sequence.