Mammoth Cave National Park contains a spectacular suite of plant communities; many of which are dependent on wildland fire as a disturbance process for their preservation. Over a third of the park is dominated by oak-hickory forests and woodlands. Fire is a fundamental process in the development and maintenance of this important community type. Since the park’s first prescribed fire in 2002, 16,700 acres of forest, woodlands, and barrens have been treated with prescribed fire. Initial goals for the prescribed fires were to reduce the density of tree saplings in the understory and increase the cover of herbaceous herbs in the understory. After a single burn, wildland fuel loading was reduced by 18%, density of understory trees (dbh \u3c 15cm) was reduced by more than 30%, and mean cover of graminoid species increased from \u3c 0.01% to 5.2%
