Abstract

One of the most complex problems facing in tropical forests, particularly in the deciduous forests, is the recurrent incidence of fire. It is well known that fire causes extensive damage in the forest ecosystem by quantitatively as well as qualitatively. In India 75 of the total forest cover are coming under highly fire prone forest types like moist deciduous, dry deciduous and thom forests. The main objectives of the present study are to characterize the physical aspects of fire in the moist deciduous forest, to study the changes brought about by fire on vegetation and their regeneration and to explore the feasibility of silvicultural techniques such as stump planting to improve upon fire survival of tree seedlings. The study area is located in the moist deciduous forest of Thrissur forest division, Kerala State, India. Impacts of fire on forests mainly depend on the intensity and periodicity of fire. Hence, to study fire ecological aspects, twelve 0. 25ha (50m x 50m) plots