Fuels management in the Subtropical Mountains Division
This article is part of a larger document. View the larger document here.Abstract
The heterogeneity of the forests west of the Mississippi River in the Southern United States is strongly influenced by physiography and topography. The west Gulf Coastal Plain of southern Arkansas, northwestern Louisiana, and eastern Texas features highly productive pine-dominated forests (Pinus spp.) on gentle terrain that are interspersed by major and minor alluvial bottomland hardwood forests. The Ozark Mountains are an uplifted eroded dolomitic plateau in northern Arkansas, eastern Oklahoma, and southern Missouri; they feature primarily oak-hickory (Quercus spp.– Carya spp.) forests with a minor and varying pine component that was far more widely distributed 150 years ago than it is today. Both of these areas support forests similar in species composition and fire dependency as types farther to the east.