Burning Forests

The myth persists that in 1492 the Western Hemisphere was an untamed wilderness and that it was European settlers who harnessed and transformed its ecosystems. But scholarship shows that forests, in particular, had been altered to varying degrees well before the arrival of Europeans. Native populations had converted much of the forests that burning by native populations was done only sporadically, to augment the effects of natural fires.

However, a large body of evidence for the routine practice of burning exists in the geographical record. One group of researchers found, for example, that sedimentary charcoal accumulations in what is now the northeastern United States are greatest where known native American settlements were greatest. Other evidence shows that, while the characteristics forestland was characterized by open, herbaceous undergrowth, another result of the clearing brought about by burning.

In North America, controlled burning created conditions favorable to berries and other fire-tolerant and sun-loving foods. Burning also converted mixed stands of trees to homogeneous forest, for example the longleaf, slash pine, and scrub oak forests of the southeastern U.S. Natural fires do account for some of this vegetation, but regular burning This succession is also evident elsewhere in similar low tropical elevations in the Caribbean and Mexico.