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TCEF Grid - Monitoring wildland fuels

Status
Completed
Start Date
January, 1996

Monitoring wildland fuel characteristics on a 330 m grid across the entire TCEF.

Most ecological studies fail to account for ecosystem response and its variability over large space and long time scales. Impacts of many disturbances and management actions, such as climate change, mountain pine beetle outbreaks, timber harvesting, and wildland fire, must be studied across large areas to ensure the scale of the disturbance match the scale of analysis, and they must be studied for over long time periods to ensure all ecosystem responses are detected. 

The Tenderfoot Creek Experimental Forest (TCEF) Grid project was designed to establish a set of gridded plots across the TCEF to monitor changes in vegetation and fuel conditions. We permanently established tenth-acre fixed area plots on a 330-m grid across the Tenderfoot Creek Experimental Forest (TCEF) to monitor changes in vegetation and fuel dynamics over large spatial and temporal domains. This gridded network of plots allows scientists interested in studying lodgepole pine forests a unique resource of vegetation and fuel information re-measured after a 15-year interval over a large spatial extent.

Principal Investigators:
Robert Keane
Colin Hardy

Funding Contributor(s):

RMRS Fire, Fuel, and Smoke Science Program
US Forest Service
USFS Rocky Mountain Research Station
Initial work was funded by the Fire Ecology and Fuels Research Work Unit (RWU4403), now part of the Fire, Fuel, and Smoke Science Program (RWU4405) at the Rocky Mountain Research Station. The most recent work was funded primarily by the US Forest Service, Forest Health Protection, Ecosystem Management program (INT-EM-F-11-03) with support from RWU4405.
 
Project Years: 1996 - 2016

Images

Image: Dots represent the gridded plot locations established in the TCEF Grid project.

Image: Dots represent the gridded plot locations established in the TCEF Grid project.

Key Personnel

Principal Investigator

Contact

Research Staff
Duncan C. Lutes

Collaborators

  • Research Collaborators:

    Martin Ammann, Todd Carlson, Caitlin Christopher, Greg Cohn, Courtney Couch, Stacy Drury, Sarah Flanary, Janice Garner, Corey Gaul, Lance Glasgow, Corey Gucker, Violet Holley, Lisa Holsinger, Sharon Hood, Brian Izbicki, Cam Johnston, Holly Keane, Jon Kinion, Signe Leirfallom, Dennis Lemond, Don Long, Christy Lowney, Jim Menakis, Billy Metzger, Scott Mincemoyer, Ed O’Donnell, Amy Olson Jhen Rawling, Zane Reneau, Tyson Robbins, Kevin Ryan Kirsten Schmidt, Pam Sikkink, Aaron Sparks, Bridget Tinsley Dewi Yokelson, Intan Yokelson

  • Contributor(s):

    • Lewis and Clark National Forest
    • White Sulphur Springs Ranger District
    • Lewis & Clark Fire Crew
    • National Center for Landscape Fire Analysis

  • Funding Contributor(s):

    • RMRS Fire, Fuel, and Smoke Science Program
    • US Forest Service
    • USFS Rocky Mountain Research Station

  • Additional Funding:

    Initial work was funded by the Fire Ecology and Fuels Research Work Unit (RWU4403), now part of the Fire, Fuel, and Smoke Science Program (RWU4405) at the Rocky Mountain Research Station. The most recent work was funded primarily by the US Forest Service, Forest Health Protection, Ecosystem Management program (INT-EM-F-11-03) with support from RWU4405.

Select Publications

  • Hood, S.M., Keane, R.E., Smith, H.Y., Egan, J., Holsinger, L. (In Prep). Challenges in Predicting Fire Behavior in Lodgepole Pine Forests Attacked by Mountain Pine Beetle. Forest Ecology and Management.

Last updated October 31, 2024
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