Pond pine (Pinus serotina) grows in the southeastern Coastal Plain from New Jersey southward through central Florida and west into southeast Alabama.

Pond pine often grows in places with a high water table and nutrient poor, acid soils such as pocosins, pond pine woodlands, wet flatwoods, shrub bogs savannas, bay forests and swamps. Pond pine often grows in association with a dense vine and shrub layer and very few herbs. Very little specific information is available on animal use of pond pine. Animals tend to be typical of the communities in which pond pine occurs.

Under the natural historical fire regime most pond pine sites burned infrequently often under drought conditions. Where there are high understory fuel loads fires are intense. There is, however, considerable variation in the frequency with which pond pine sites burn ranging from 3 to 150 years. This variation is related to the diversity of sites in which pond pine grows. After many years without fire many pond pine communities are thought to succeed to bay forests. Many pond pine sites have suffered from an altered fire regime with fire return frequencies lengthened and the season shifted from growing to dormant season.

Pond pine is well adapted to fires. It is perhaps the southern pine most tolerant of intense fires and unlike other southern pines, will reproduce vegetatively. Pond pine?s serotinous cones

also promote sexual reproduction after severe fires.

Prescribed fire is used in pond pine communities for fuel management, ecological purposes such as maintenance of biodiversity, maintenance of plant and animal habitat, and for silvicultural purposes. Smoke management is often a concern in burning pond pine sites due to organic soils and high fuel loads. Some pond pine sites fall within jurisdictional wetlands thus some management activities associated with a fire management program may require wetland permits.

Pond pine (Pinus serotina) grows in the southeastern Coastal Plain from New Jersey southward through central Florida and west into southeast Alabama (Bramlett 1990).

Natural communities in which pond pine occurs include pocosins, pond pine woodlands, wet flatwoods, savannas, bay forests, shrub bogs and swamps. (Bramlett 1990, FNAI 1990, Harms 1996). Pond pine acreage is extensive in the Carolinas in pocosins and associated pond pine woodlands. Throughout the rest of its range it occurs where hydrologic and soil conditions favor pond pine.

Pond pine often grows in places with a high water table and acid soils. Of the southern pines, this species is dominant on the wettest pine sites (Bramlett 1990, Harms 1996). Pond pine grows on better-drained mineral sites, but other faster growing pines dominate on drier sites (Bramlett 1990). Sites on which pond pine occurs often have long hydroperiods. Pocosins and pond pine woodlands are saturated or seasonally flooded for 6-9 months per year (Sutter and Kral 1994). Shrub bogs are permanently or semi-permanently saturated and wet flatwoods are flooded for 1 or more months per year (FNAI 1990).

Pond pine commonly grows on organic soils (Histosols), particularly in pocosins, pond pine woodlands, bay forests and other swamps. It also grows on mineral soils, Entisols, and Spodosols within flatwoods and savannas (Harms 1996, Schafale and Weakley 1990). Soils are often nutrient poor and strongly acidic. In Florida flatwoods, pond pine grows on the most acidic sites (pH 3.5 to 4.1) whereas other pines grow where soils are neutral or basic (Edmisten 1965). Pocosins are likely the most nutrient limited sites on which pond pine grows. On sites with mineral soils or only shallow organic deposits, vegetation can root in mineral soils where nutrients are less limiting than in organic soils (Sharitz and Gresham 1998).

Pocosins and pond pine woodlands are often found in association with one another. Pond pine woodlands are located on the outer portions of large peat domes where peat deposits are less thick than in central portions where pocosins are located. Nutrient and water inputs to pond pine woodlands are augmented from inputs from surrounding communities unlike pocosins that are fed strictly from rainfall.

Vegetation

Pond pine often grows in association with a dense vine and shrub layer, especially in communities such as wet flatwoods, pocosins, pond pine woodlands bay forests and shrub bogs.

Pond pine woodlands have shrub layers that are often dense and grow up to 5 m tall. The tree canopy is open or closed. Tree species that may occur in the canopy or shrub layer include loblolly bay (Gordonia lasianthus), sweetbay magnolia (Magnolia virginiana), red maple (Acer rubrum), loblolly pine (Pinus taeda) and Atlantic white cedar (Chamaecyparis thyoides). Shrubs include titi (Cyrilla racemiflora), fetterbush (Lyonia lucida), and gallberry (Ilex glabra), dangleberry (Gaylussacia frondosa), large gallberry (Ilex coriacea), sweet pepperbush (Clethra alnifolia), and maleberry (Lyonia ligustrina) in addition to high pocosin species (Weakley and Schafale 1991). Some pond pine woodlands are dominated by switch cane (Arundinaria gigantea). Herbs are uncommon except in the fire maintained ecotone where pond pine woodlands border wet flatwoods or pine savannas (Weakley and Schafale 1991).

Pond pine flatwoods typically have a fairly open canopy. The shrub and vine midstory is often dense. They have a similar suite of understory shrubs as pond pine woodlands, however shrub stature is typically lower that that of pond pine woodlands (Schafale and Weakley 1990). Typical shrubs include fetterbush, gallberry, huckleberry, and saw palmetto (Serenoa repens). Laurel leaf greenbrier (Smilax laurifolia) is a common vine (FNAI 1990). Where shrubs and vines are dense, herbs are sparse. Pond pine flatwoods sampled by Edmisten (1963 in Abrahamson and Hartnett 1990) were less floristically rich than flatwoods dominated by other pine species.

Common tree associates in many pond pine communities include loblolly bay, swamp tupelo (Nyssa sylvatica var. biflora), sweetbay, red bay (Persea borbonia), bald cypress (Taxodium disichum), pond cypress (Taxodium ascendens), water oak (Quercus nigra), red maple, and sweetgum (Liquidambar styraciflua). Pond pine can be found with other pine species; principally loblolly pine on deep peat and pocosin sites, and with longleaf pine and slash pine on flatwoods sites (Harms 1996, Schafale and Weakley 1990).

Pond pine occasionally grows in association with herbs. Pond pine can be co-dominant or dominant with longleaf pine in very wet pine savannas in the Carolinas. A defining characteristic of pine savanna is the dominance of herbs in the groundcover layer (Schafale and Weakley 1990). Pine savanna with pond pine as a dominant or codominant is not widespread. In more southerly regions pond pine may also grow in association with herbs and hydrophitic shrubs on the wettest sites associated with frequent fire (FNAI 1990).

See the sections Distribution and Composition of Pocosins, Distribution and Composition of Shrub Bogs, Longleaf Pine, and Slash Pine for more information about communities in which pond pine may grow.

Animals

Very little specific information is available on animal use of pond pine. Animals tend to be typical of the communities in which pond pine occurs.

Pond pine can reach a size, age and physical state that can serve as habitat for the federally listed red cockaded woodpecker (RCW), particularly in extensive pond pine woodlands associated with pocosins (Sharitz and Gresham 1998). The propensity of pond pine for becoming infected with red heart rot (Bramlett 1990), a fungal infection that makes heartwood soft, may encourage RCW use of pines for cavities. For more information, see Longleaf pine, the species most commonly used as RCW habitat.

See the sections Distribution and Composition of Pocosins, Distribution and Composition of Shrub Bogs, Longleaf Pine, and Slash Pine for more information on animals associated with pond pine communities.

Anthropogenic Alterations to the Fire Regime

Like most coastal plain fire communities, the natural fire regime of pond pine communities has been altered since pre-Columbian times (FNAI 1990, Schafale and Weakley 1990). Fires are less frequent today than in the pre-Columbian period. Though there is little published information specifically about pond pine communities, the general pattern is a shift from growing season fires to dormant season fires. Due to less frequent fires and increased fuel loads, many fires today may be more intense and more severe than historically. Further, the hydrology of many very wet sites has been altered (FNAI 1990, Richardson and Gibbons 1993) thus fire effects are likely changed.

Fire Regime

Fires in most pond pine communities are relatively infrequent. Because pond pine grows on wet sites, frequent fires of uplands and slightly drier flatwoods do not regularly penetrate into pond pine sites. Under the natural historical fire regime these sites burned under drought conditions. Depending on the community type in which pond pine grows it may experience fire only every 50-150 years in woody bogs or swamps or every 3 to 10 years in wet Flatwoods (FNAI 1990). In the extensive pond pine woodlands associated with pocosins, fires likely occurred every 10-20 years (Sutter and Kral 1994). There is variation in the frequencies reported for pond pine woodland likely due to the wide range of variations in this community type. Frost (1995) gave fire return frequencies of 13 – 50 years for communities that can be interpreted as pond pine woodland. Qualitative descriptions of pond pine woodland state that they likely burned slightly more frequently than high or low pocosin due to slightly drier sites on which pond pine woodland occurs (Schafale and Weakley 1990).

These infrequent fires are often intense due to the high understory fuel loads. Qualitative community descriptions describe pond pine woodland as having a more closed canopy and a taller shrub layer than high pocosin (Schafale and Weakley 1990), i.e., more fuel than high pocosin. Values reported for fuel loads in pocosin fuels probably include pond pine woodland. These values range from 10-25 tons per acre (Sharitz and Gresham 1998, Bramlett 1990, Bucher and High 2000, Wade and Ward 1973).

Pond pine communities are often considered intermediate successionally. On large peatlands, pocosins succeed to bay forest, or Atlantic white cedar forest (See Successional Relationships of Peatland Communities). On these same sites, too frequent or severe a fire may eliminate pond pines. On other soils, lack of fires produces bay forests or other swamp types (Abrahamson and Hartnett 1990). In fact some authors view pond pine flatwoods as burned out bay forests (Abrahamson and Hartnett 1990).

Where pond pine grows in association with herbaceous vegetation, as in some flatwoods or savannas, these sites generally experience frequent fires. Fires in these systems are likely on the order of every three years as opposed to once per decade (FNAI 1990).

Under a natural fire regime, edges of pond pine communities likely experienced more frequent fires than the entire community. Where these communities abut frequent fire communities such as mesic flatwoods or pine savanna frequent fires would sweep down slope from drier communities into pond pine communities until encountering a fuel moisture level that was too wet to support fire. This ecotone is often herb dominated and habitat for rare plants (Weakley and Schafale 1991). Thus, healthy pond pine woodland/pine savanna or wet flatwoods transition zones are herb dominated.

In pond pine woodlands that burn frequently (every 7-12 years), switch cane can become a dominant understory shrub (Frost 1995). Robertson et al. (1998) state that a frequency of 3-5 years promotes switch cane in pond pine woodlands and frequencies of 10-20 years promote shrubs. The rapid growth of cane promotes fuel build-up and its flammability may make cane-dominated pocosins more susceptible to fire more often than shrub dominated pocosins, thus perpetuating themselves (Schafale and Weakley 1990). Reductions in fire frequency have been implicated in the apparent historical decline of canebrake vegetation within pocosins (Frost 2000). Many sites that are now pond pine woodland may formerly have been canebrake communities (Schafale and Weakley 1990) when the natural fire regime was uninterrupted and frequent fires more common.

See the sections Slash pine understory plant response, Longleaf Pine understory plant response, Fire Effects in Shrub bogs and Fire Effects in Pocosins and Large Shrub Bogs for more information on associated plant and animal responses to fires.

Pond pine is perhaps the southern pine most tolerant of intense fires and unlike other southern pines, will reproduce vegetatively. Pond pines are known to tolerate crown scorch and when branches are killed by intense fire will re-sprout from buds along the main stem (epicormic buds) to produce new branches. Pond pine can also sprout from the root collar if the entire aboveground stem is killed (Wade and Ward 1973).

In addition to tolerating intense fires, pond pine is like other southern pines in that regeneration is tied to fire. Today, most extensive pond pine stands date to wildfires (Bramlett 1990). Like sand pine, pond pine produces serotinous cones that remain closed until heated. Upon heating to approximately 160°C – 170°C (330°F - 335°F) cones open releasing seeds (Bramlett 1990). Heat produced by intense fires does not appear to damage germination rates. Pond pine is shade intolerant and thus grows better where competition is reduced (Bramlett 1990). Fires then play a role in seedling establishment and growth by removing other competing plants thereby creating a more favorable environment for pond pine establishment and growth.

(See Plants of Pocosins and Shrub Bogs: Adaptations to Fire for a discussion of shrub adaptation to fire).