Perturbaciones actuales del bosque norpatagónico chileno derivadas de los efectos de grandes fuegos de medio siglo atrásestudio preliminar en la cuenca andina del río Figueroa

Abstract

The northpatagonic forests of the Aisén meridional region (44°-48° S) have suffered huge fires between 1936 and 1952. These fires have been produced by pioneers and stockman that burned the native vegetation in order to live in the prairie. Because of that, the forest was reduced in 37% in that period. After half a century of produced this impact, the burned ecosystem begins to regenerate with difficulty because of the nowadays human interventions and due to mass movements in the Andean mountain that remove important areas of forest. A case study is presented, the valley of the Figueroa River, in an intermountain northpatagonic basin, located to the north of the Aisén region. In this area, the past and recent fires forests along with the erosion derived from the clearance of forest for logs and wood. For these reasons, the Nothofagus forests and conifers do not reach to recompose the original forest landscape.