1. Group fieldwork: The chance to work altogether in a field so early in our student degrees was an incredible opportunity and one of the best overall parts of this experience. The ability to go from talking about doing fieldwork in the future in hypothetical terms to actually doing it for our own project has been an extreme privilege and a great time for us all.
2. Fire Ecology: It is a growing field of science with its implications ever more important with the climatic changes increasing. The choice of the topic for our study was very deliberate, and it is a rare opportunity to have access to a burned area for the scientific purposes. It has been a great joy to work in the heart of such important research.
3. Group Dynamics: The biggest highlight of this experience however was to not only work altogether but having a chance to form close friendships with everyone involved in the project, that go outside of the university classrooms. All of us also lived in the same property as part of our fieldwork process and it has been a meaningful opportunity to get to know each other very well.

Background and (Research) Approach

We started our project with the aim to investigate post-fire vegetation recovery patterns in December of 2025, following a wildfire in the Serra do Acor region of Portugal in August of the same year. Our project’s purpose was to contribute data on the recovery of the burned area, and to gain experience working scientifically in the field.

We planned to gather data on the abundance of woody species in both the burned and unburned sites available to us and compare them in terms of the proportions of invasive species, as well as prevalence of pyrophytic species.

Our planned method for collecting this data ended up being 10 meter long transect lines. We would then gather information on all woody species within 50 cm to either side of the line. We decided on this method rather than plots, as this allowed us to capture the gradient of environmental factors across our sites, without compromising on sample size.

We were able to use a Faro M70 Terrestrial Laser scanner to add a second dimension to our study. Using the laser scanner, we aimed to capture information on the structural differences in the sites prior to and after the burn. We used the centre of each transect used for botany as a point for the laser scanner to allow comparisons of individual plots, and to streamline our work on site.

We hypothesized with respect to the botanical aspect of our study, that there would be a higher proportion of invasive species in the burned area. In regard to the laser scanning, we hypothesized that there would be more complex forest structures in the unburned site.

Role of the Student Project

As mentioned above, one of the main aims of this project was to allow each of us to get hands-on experience working scientifically. The project being self-organized by us as bachelor’s students forced us to engage in all the organisational aspects of both designing a study and dealing with the unexpected challenges on site in Portugal. The project added significantly to each of our educations as students of Ecosystem Sciences. Being able to contribute data of some value at this stage in our education has prepared us for future scientific work.

Scientific Exchange and Integration

Working scientifically as a group was a part of the work that forced us all to engage actively with the content we had been learning. This was a major part of the project, as many of us had not worked scientifically prior. Communicating with the other members of our faculty and beyond was another aspect that proved extremely helpful. Huge thanks should go to Dominic Seidel, Sarah Weil, Brigitta Putzenlechner, and Jonas Firke for being irreplaceable help in various stages of our project.

Organisation, framework conditions, and outlook

Our fieldwork took place in Quinta da Mizarela in Portugal. Our contacts on site allowed us to stay for free, contributing 4 hours in volunteer work a day for the property, and working on the project for the rest of the day. Because of this arrangement, the funding sufficed for equipment, and all everyone's travel costs to Portugal.

Once we reached the property we unfortunately found that our control site, which we expected to be intact, had been affected by fire, although to a significantly lower degree than the burned site. Because of the limited time available, and our plans, we decided to nonetheless continue with our original study plan. Site B serves as a comparative baseline for low-intensity fire recovery, as it retains much of its pre-fire structure, including mature Pinus and Eucalyptus canopy trees. Discussing how to deal with this setback was one of the most valuable learning opportunities from this project. Nothing was exactly as we envisioned it originally, forcing us to improvise, communicate effectively, and problem solve almost daily throughout the whole two weeks.

Outcome

The botanical data from the sixty transects reveal a significant shift in community structure, species abundance, and taxonomic diversity between the two burned areas. Site A (Severely Burned) exhibited high total abundance with 1,689 individual plants, but a restricted total species richness of only 23 unique species. In contrast, Site B (Lightly Burned) contained a lower total abundance of 1,048 individual plants but supported a significantly broader diversity of 40 unique species.

In the severely burned Site A, post-fire recovery is structurally and botanically simplified. The rapid dominance of flammable, pyrophytic seeders (Cytisus sp. and Ulex sp.) creates a dense but structurally homogenous pioneer shrubland. This community is characterized by high canopy openness (mean: 86.29), a depressed Mean Fractal Dimension (MeanFD, mean: 2.55), and a heavily compressed Effective Number of Layers (ENL, mean: 20.73) leading to a low Stand Structural Complexity Index (SSCI, mean: 3.71) This structural homogeneity suggests that while these pyrophytic species are highly adapted to rapid post-fire colonization, they form a simple, highly flammable fuel bed that may perpetuate a feedback loop of frequent, high-intensity fires in the region. Conversely, the less severely burned Site B retains its pre-fire structural complexity. The survival of mature Eucalyptus and Pinus trees, coupled with the vigorous vegetative recovery of the understory colonizer Rubus sp., maintains a more complex, multi-layered forest structure. This is quantitatively confirmed by lower Canopy Openness (mean: 46.74), high Mean FD (mean: 4.31), and high ENL (mean: 25.52), resulting in a markedly higher SSCI (mean: 5.55 compared to 3.71 in Site A). The 49% increase in structural complexity in the lightly burned area suggests a much more heterogeneous and multi-layered canopy compared to the simplified structure of the severely burned site.

Those results support our hypothesis of invasive species with pyrophytic traits being much more prevalent in the areas affected by severe fires as well as that the structural complexity of less affected areas would be higher. The rapid, dense recovery of highly flammable pyrophytic species (Cytisus, Ulex) and invasive colonizers (Acacia) in severely burned areas highlights the urgent need for active post-fire management. The current data reveals a landscape at a critical point in its recovery. Site A is currently dominated by 'obligate seeders' (Cytisus and Ulex), which have rapidly colonized the bare soil. If these species reach maturity and build up a large seed bank before the next fire event, the site may become locked into a high-frequency fire cycle, effectively preventing the re-establishment of fire-resistant climax species like Quercus sp. (Oak), which currently represents less than 0.3% of the recorded individuals in the burned area.

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