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Is there a dry season in the Southeast US?
Author(s) -
Terando Adam,
Hiers John Kevin,
Williams Marcus,
Goodrick Scott L.,
O'Brien Joseph J.
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
global change biology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 4.146
H-Index - 255
eISSN - 1365-2486
pISSN - 1354-1013
DOI - 10.1111/gcb.15399
Subject(s) - dry season , precipitation , geography , climate change , wet season , subtropics , physical geography , environmental science , climatology , ecology , meteorology , biology , geology , cartography
Fill et al. ( Global Change Biology , 25, 3562–3569, 2019) reported significant increases in dry season length over the past 120 years in the Southeast US, suggesting increased wildfire risk in a region associated with a frequent fire regime. We identified two flaws that call into question the findings and their relevance to regional wildfire risk. First, with the exception of Florida, there is little evidence for a climatologically meaningful ‘dry season’ in the Southeast because most areas experience relatively evenly distributed monthly precipitation. Second, the sampling method used to derive Cumulative Rainfall Anomalies does not appear to actually reflect a bootstrap sample as described.