Water-Level Change in Boreal Lakes as an Indicator of Area Burned and Number of Ignitions in the Canadian Prairie Provinces.

• Author / Creator

  Fleming, Thomas, M

• The relationship between water-level fluctuations of lakes and fire activity has never been elucidated in great detail. The majority of scientific research on wildfire-hydro-climate-vegetation dynamics examines patterns of traditional climatological variables such as temperature and precipitation and their influence on fuel moistures and fire risk at localized spatial scales. The study of lake-level changes in relation to fire was assessed to determine whether lakes are representative of broad scale environmental conditions, and are capable of explaining variability in fire activity (number of fires and area burned) in the western portion of Canada’s Boreal ecozone. This study used mean monthly water-levels of 25 naturally regulated lakes in the Boreal regions of Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan and determined the statistical correlation they exhibited with annual area burned and rates of fire occurrence. The findings from the study suggest that water-level fluctuations are correlated strongly with area burned and number of ignitions and that lake level departure values were able to match or exceed the predictive capability of traditional fire indices in multiple linear regression models.

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Prairie
  • Wildfires
  • Boreal
  • Canada
  • Lake Levels

• Graduation date

  Spring 2016

• Type of Item

  Thesis

• Degree

  Master of Science

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/R3959CG6H

• License

  This thesis is made available by the University of Alberta Libraries with permission of the copyright owner solely for non-commercial purposes. This thesis, or any portion thereof, may not otherwise be copied or reproduced without the written consent of the copyright owner, except to the extent permitted by Canadian copyright law.