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Fire is one of the main disturbance factors shaping the landscape, and landscape is a key driver of fire behavior. Considering the role played by land use and land cover (LULC) changes as the main driver of landscape dynamics, the aim of this study was to calculate and analyze (i) the real impact of fire on LULC changes and (ii) how these LULC changes were influencing the fire regime. We used methods of historical geography and socio-spatial systemic analysis for reconstructing and assessing the LULC change and fire history in six case studies in the Central Mountain System (Spain) from archival documentary sources and historical cartography. The main result is an accurate dataset of fire records from 1497 to 2013 and a set of LULC maps for three time points (1890s–1930s, 1956–1957, and the 2000s). We have shown the nonlinear evolution of the fire regime and the importance of the local scale when assessing the interaction of landscape dynamics and fire regime variation. Our findings suggest that LULC trends have been the main influencing factor of fire regime variation in Central Spain since the mid-19th century., Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (MINECO), Depto. de Geografía, Fac. de Geografía e Historia, TRUE, pub

Wildfires in the Iberian Peninsula were large and frequent in the second half of the 20th century. Land use and land cover (LULC) also changed greatly. Our aim was to understand the relationship between LULC and fire in the western and eastern ends of the Iberian Central Mountain System. We compared two case study landscapes, the Estrela massif and the Ayllón massif, which are biophysically similar but with different social-ecological contexts. In both, fires were in general more likely in shrublands and pastures than in forests. Shrublands replaced forests after fires. Contrasting LULC in the two massifs, particularly pastures, likely explained the differences in fire occurrence, and reflected different regional land use policies and history. Fire here is a social-ecological system, influenced by specific LULC and with implications from landscape to regional scales. Understanding how LULC changes interact with fire is powerful for improving landscape and regional planning., Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (MINECO), Depto. de Geografía, Fac. de Geografía e Historia, TRUE, pub

Humans and fire form a coupled and co-evolving natural-human system in Mediterranean-climate ecosystems. In this context, recent trends in landscape change, such as urban sprawl or the abandoning of agricultural and forest land management in line with new models of economic development and lifestyles, are leading to new fire scenarios. A fire scenario refers to the contextual factors of a fire regime, i.e., the environmental, socio-economic and policy drivers of wildfire initiation and propagation on different spatial and temporal scales. This is basically a landscape concept linking territorial dynamics (related to ecosystem evolution and settlement patterns) with a fire regime (ignition causes; spread patterns; fire frequency, severity, extent and seasonality). The aim of this article is to identify and characterize these land-based fire scenarios in Spain on a national and regional scale, using a GIS-based methodology to perform a spatial analysis of the area attributes of homogenous fire spread patterns. To do this, the main variables considered are: land use/land cover, fuel load and recent fire history. The final objective is to reduce territorial vulnerability to forest wildfires and facilitate the adaptation of fire policies and land management systems to current challenges of preparedness and uncertainty management., Unión Europea. FP7, Unión Europea. FP6, Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (MINECO)/FEDER, Depto. de Geografía, Fac. de Geografía e Historia, TRUE, pub