Climatic niche position determines post-fire resilience in Mediterranean forests
Codina, Gerard (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Departament de Biologia Animal, de Biologia Vegetal i d'Ecologia)
Sánchez-Pinillos, Martina (Université du Québec à Montréa)
Lloret Maya, Francisco (Centre de Recerca Ecològica i d'Aplicacions Forestals)
Lecina-Diaz, Judit (Technical University of Munich)
Batllori, Enric (Universitat de Barcelona. Institut de Recerca de la Biodiversitat (IRBio))

Data:	2026
Resum:	Fires are a common and significant disturbance in Mediterranean forest ecosystems with a prominent role in their dynamics. The increased frequency, intensity and extent of fires due to climate change are, however, expected to exceed forests' resilience capacity. It is still unknown how resilience capacity changes across species' biogeographical ranges in relation to pre- and post-fire environmental variability. We analysed the resilience of Mediterranean pinewoods (Pinus halepensis and P. nigra) to fire in the Eastern Iberian Peninsula and considered the influence of pre- and post-fire climate conditions typified through the species' climate niche. To assess forest resilience, we applied the Ecological Dynamic Regime (EDR) framework, a methodological approach to quantify the deviation of disturbed trajectories from their dynamic regimes using three indices: amplitude, recovery and net change. Then, we evaluated how fire characteristics (severity), site attributes (exposure, rockiness) and deviations in the distance to the niche core and edge of the burned populations (centrality-marginality gradient) modulate their resilience to fire. Over 50% of the burned plots exhibited large net change from their dynamic regimes in the midterm, denoting poor resilience regardless of the species' regenerative strategy, and transitioned to shrublands or a different forest type after the fire. Recovery and net change exhibited differences between the two studied species: forests dominated by P. halepensis were overall more resilient to fire across the study range, especially in moist sites, while burned P. nigra forests showed poor recovery and large net changes after fire. For both species, forest location within the climatic niche before and after fire significantly explained post-fire resilience. In general, forests near their climatic niche core showed higher resilience compared with those close to the dry edge of the niche. Synthesis. Our study reveals that post-fire forest resilience depends not only on fire severity and fire characteristics but also on the climatic niche position of the forests. As climate warms and the frequency and intensity of fires increase, forest species will be pushed towards the dry edge of their climatic niches, likely increasing their vulnerability.
Ajuts:	Agencia Estatal de Investigación PID2020-115264RB-I00 Generalitat de Catalunya 2021/SGR-00849 European Commission 891477
Nota:	Altres ajuts: acords transformatius de la UAB
Drets:	Aquest document està subjecte a una llicència d'ús Creative Commons. Es permet la reproducció total o parcial, la distribució, i la comunicació pública de l'obra, sempre que no sigui amb finalitats comercials, i sempre que es reconegui l'autoria de l'obra original. No es permet la creació d'obres derivades.
Llengua:	Anglès
Document:	Article ; recerca ; Versió publicada
Publicat a:	Journal of ecology, Vol. 114, Num. 2 (February 2026) , art. e70261, ISSN 1365-2745

DOI: 10.1111/1365-2745.70261

20 p, 1.3 MB

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