Abstract:

Understanding the probability of fire occurrence at different spatial locations has important significance for forest fire prevention and management. Many factors and their complicated interactions may affect the occurrence of fire. These make the predicting of fire occurrence very difficult. Fire occurrence prediction has become hot topics in the field of forest fire research. This study was conducted in Huzhong area of the Daxingan Mountains. By using weights of evidence, we chose the natural and anthropogenic factors that comprehensively affect forest fire occurrence, including aspect, topographic position, annual mean temperature, annual precipitation, 1 hour dead fuel loads, 10 hour dead fuel load, 1 hour dead fuel water content and distance to road. With these chosen factors as evidences, the fire occurrence probability map was generated. Our results showed that fire occurrence in Huzhong area had uncertainty to some extent. But our results still have significant implications for forest management. They may provide scientific basis for zoning forest fire risk and choosing priority areas for fuel treatment. Future research should be focused on forest fuels, especially on the spatial and temporal distribution of forest fuel load, to improve the accuracy of forest fuel data and to predict scientifically the occurrence of forest fire.

Key words: Daxing'an Mountains, Huzhong area, forest fire, weights of evidence