It plays a key role in shaping ecosystems by serving as an agent of renewal and change. But fire can be deadly, destroying homes, wildlife habitats and timber, and polluting the air with emissions harmful to human health. Fire also releases carbon dioxide—a key greenhouse gas—into the atmosphere.

Clearly, fire can shape ecosystem composition, structure and functions by selecting fire-adapted species and removing other susceptible species, releasing nutrients from the biomass and improving nutrient cycling, affecting soil properties through changing soil microbial activities and water relations.

Fires affect animals mainly through effects on their habitat. Fires often cause short-term increases in wildlife foods that contribute to increases in populations of some animals. These increases are moderated by the animals’ ability to thrive in the altered, often simplified, structure of the postfire environment.

Many plants depend both directly and indirectly on regular burns in order to survive. … Fires can also kill diseases and insects that could otherwise destroy many plants. Other plants rely on fires to remove debris from the forest floor to reduce competition for growth and allow more access to light.

As a driver of climate change, wildfires release huge quantities of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. … While trees can and do regrow after fire, building back carbon takes time, which is precisely what we lack in the fight against climate change.

Wildfires increase air pollution in surrounding areas and can affect regional air quality. The effects of smoke from wildfires can range from eye and respiratory tract irritation to more serious disorders, including reduced lung function, bronchitis, exacerbation of asthma and heart failure, and premature death.

In grassland ecosystems, high-severity fires have been shown to increase the amount of nutrients mobilized and alter the hydrologic response of catchments

Wildfires can disrupt transportation, communications, power and gas services, and water supply. They also lead to a deterioration of the air quality, and loss of property, crops, resources, animals and people.

At a low intensity, flames can clean up debris and underbrush on the forest floor, add nutrients to the soil, and open up space to let sunlight through to the ground. That sunlight can nourish smaller plants and give larger trees room to grow and flourish.

During wildfires, the nutrients from dead trees are returned to the soil. The forest floor is exposed to more sunlight, allowing seedlings released by the fire to sprout and grow. … Sometimes, post-wildfire landscapes will explode into thousands of flowers, in the striking phenomenon known as a super bloom.

One of the most important environmental effects of burning is the increased probability of further burning in subsequent years, as dead trees topple to the ground, opening up the forest to dry by sunlight, and building up the fuel load with an increase in fire-prone species, such as pyrophytic grasses.

Fire is a natural part of the grassland ecosystem and helps maintain its health and vigor. It warms up the soil and reduces the leaf litter that accumulates each year, allowing sunlight to penetrate. … Big bluestem, purple coneflower and blazing star are among the many species that thrive with fire.

Wildfires are a natural part of many environments. They are nature’s way of clearing out the dead litter on forest floors. This allows important nutrients to return to the soil, enabling a new healthy beginning for plants and animals. Fires also play an important role in the reproduction of some plants.