XVI International Botanical Congess

Fire is treated as one of the main producer of disturbances in Boreal Forest, which rotation averages 40-200 years (Goldammer, Furyaev 1996, Johnson, 1996). According to the data available the proportion of anthropogenic fires amounts to 80%-99% of the total number of fires. Nonetheless, it is mostly agreed that anthropogenic fires do not affect modern periodicity of fires. Such viewpoint is in contrast with the empirical data which shows correlation between periodicity of fires and density of population. Present investigation proves that natural rotation of fires, as well as of windthrows, does not equal to modern one and estimates >1000 years. The work was supported by grant (N 111) from the Russian Program ABiodiversity@