Montane and sub-alpine ecosystems have variable ecological responses to fire that are ultimately influenced by long-term, historical fire regimes and the evolutionary forces that have governed post-fire regeneration strategies of the biota. Two contrasting strategies in temperate forests are illustrated here. SE Australian mountain ash  forests are adapted to a high-severity fire regime, consisting of infrequent , large stand-replacing wildfires . Mountain ash is a long-lived obligate seeder but is slow to reach reproductive maturity  . As such, natural post-fire regeneration takes decades to centuries to recover to pre-fire conditions, and if fire reoccurs before reproductive maturity is reached, the species can be eliminated. By contrast, ponderosa pine  forests of the SW United States have evolved with a low- or mixed-severity fire regime, where fire is frequent , of low intensity, less likely to kill dominant stands and, thus, allow faster post-fire recovery . However, post-fire recovery times in this ecosystem are also becoming longer due to a century of effective fire suppression, shifting the fire regime to one which is more infrequent, of high intensity, extensive and stand replacing .
IPCC
Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability
IPCC Report