A change of soil properties and forest vegetation present in burned areas in Geyjoksan, Daejeon metropolitan city

Abstract

This study was conducted to investigate changes on burned areas after a forest fire in Geyjoksan which occurred in April 2000. Both soil physicochemical properties and vegetation present were analyzed in burned and unburned sites of pinus densiflora according to two slope aspects(south and north-facing slopes). The results of the analysis are as follows. The appearance species of vegetation were 21, 15 and 18 for burned site, burned site-1 and burned site-2 of pinus densiflora community respectively, indicating that the occurrence of forest fire and slope aspects affect vegetation appearance. The pH values at 0~10cm soil depth of unburned and burned sites of pinus densiflora community were 5.04 and 5.12 respectively with no significant difference between them. Mean organic matter, total nitrogen and available P also had no significant difference. This results indicate that the forest recover its former pH, total nitrogen, mean organic matter and available P over time after a forest fire. North-facing slope had relatively higher soil water content thus implying that its pH values of soil lower than south-facing slope. On the other hand, south-facing slope had high organic matter and available P content of soil as compared to north-facing slope. With south facing slope having high water contents, humus was accumulated due to slow organic matter decomposition. The pH values also decreased due to organic acids from humus. However, we observed that organic matter and P concentration in soil increased.