Soil physical, chemical and understory plant nutritional response to pinyon-juniper encroachment and prescribed fire in a central Nevada woodland

Pinyon-juniper encroachment into sagebrush-grassland communities has produced a need for viable restoration treatments of sagebrush-grasslands. In the following manuscripts we document the effects woodland expansion and spring prescribed fire used as a restoration treatment on soil physical properties particularly infiltration and water repellency, soil chemical properties, and understory aboveground biomass and tissue nutrient concentrations. We observed that water infiltration and the development of water repellency was effected by cover type, soil coarse mineral particles, and burning. Soil chemistry was affected by cover type, time, and burning. It was also determined that plant aboveground biomass and nutrient concentrations are species dependent, and that these factors are effected by time and burning. Each species had a unique response to burning, although they may follow similar trends in temporal variation. There were direct links between burning, soil chemistry, and plant aboveground biomass and tissue nutrient concentrations.