Before-after-control-impact study reveals muted avian response to low-severity wildfire

Wildfire is increasing in frequency and severity across the western United States, highlighting a need to understand how biological communities are responding to this disturbance. Bird communities are useful indicators of ecological change as they are relatively easy to survey and are a well-studied taxonomic group in terms of behavior and life history. I utilized a before-after-control-impact study design to test three hypotheses regarding bird response to wildfire in the mixed-conifer forests of the H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest, Blue River, Oregon following the Holiday Farm Fire of 2020. The Vegetation Selection Hypothesis states that after fire, birds will move to forests that most closely resemble their preferred seral stage; the Site Fidelity Hypothesis states that after fire, birds will return to where they occurred the previous year; and the Concussion Effect Hypothesis states that the landscape effect of fire will lead to birds moving into nearby, unburned habitat. Point count data collected two years prior to the fire and three years after were used to model changes in total abundance for six focal bird species. I did not detect a strong effect of fire on most of the species in my study. However, the Western Flycatcher (Empidonax difficilis) did have abundance changes that showed moderate support for the Concussion Effect Hypothesis Due to the small spatial replication in this study, I recommend further research into bird responses to wildfire using a larger dataset that includes varying fire severity.