Treesearch

The return of wolves to the American West has renewed historic conflicts on national forests. Wolves now share space with livestock across millions of acres of federal land. Forest Service research social scientists studied six national forests with wolves and livestock in six Western states. They interviewed Forest Service range management specialists, wildlife managers, and other stakeholders to understand how wolf-livestock conflicts are managed.They found that these conflicts are embedded in larger issues: rural-urban divides, federal versus state management authority, economic...

Fluvial export of dissolved carbon plays an important role in watershed‐scale biogeochemistry. Predicted changes in climate are expected to impact watershed hydrologic regimes, and in turn, the sources and export of dissolved carbon from watersheds. Here, we utilize high resolution measurements of discharge and dissolved carbon concentration to examine how concentration‐discharge (CQ) relationships vary seasonally and during high flow events over the main runoff season (May–October) in a temperate forested watershed in Southeast Alaska. Concentration‐discharge relationships for dissolved...

Fish escapes from open water net pens around the globe present persistent and unresolved challenges for aquaculture governance, environmental stewardship, and industry accountability. These escape events are widely recognized as disturbances to ecosystem services and functions [1], carry significant social and financial repercussions [2], and have prompted regional prohibitions on net-pen farming [3]. Particularly concerning is the potential for escaped fish to reproduce successfully [4], which can lead to genetic introgression with wild conspecifics or negative interactions with other...

The release of contaminants into the environment can occur from anthropogenic activities, such as oil extraction and transportation, mining, and industrial processes. Remediation associated with reducing contaminant concentrations, and restoration that improves animals and supporting habitat, are often needed to restore ecosystems to their pre-release, baseline condition. We demonstrated the application of Bayesian Decision Networks (BDNs) with two Natural Resource Damage Assessment and Restoration (NRDAR) case studies. We use a stylized case study of riparian restoration following the...

There is a global abundance of non-perennial rivers and streams, of which are predicted to increase due to environmental change and anthropogenic influences. However, most modeled representations of streamflow have been constructed with perennial systems in mind, leaving a gap in our understanding and representation of non-perennial systems. To adapt to future challenges, there is a need to determine what modeled representations of low- and no-flow in non-perennial rivers and streams do well and where uncertainties may lie in the internal representations of hydrologic processes. Here we...

Reforestation practices have potential to alter site productivity and influence forest stand development. We evaluated the effects of logging debris (LD) manipulation (LD dispersed, LD piled, and LD removed) and competing vegetation control (VC; initial VC only or annual VC for five years) on Douglas-fir stand characteristics at two sites in western Washington and Oregon, USA that contrasted strongly in soil quality (SQ). Annual VC had a pronounced effect on stand volume compared to initial VC, but the magnitude of effect was greater at the low SQ site (~50 % increase in volume) than at...

Indicator species can facilitate the assessment, management, and conservation of biodiversity. The White-headed Woodpecker (Leuconotopicus albolarvatus) is a species of conservation concern that is considered an indicator species for mature ponderosa pine ecosystems, a priority restoration habitat that has declined by 90% in the northern Blue Mountains, USA. Here, we employed passive acoustic monitoring at 227 randomly selected locations across two National Forests in the northern Blue Mountains. Autonomous recording units were deployed for an average of 4.41 weeks per station (SD = 1.21)...

Laminated root rot (LRR; caused by the fungus Coniferiporia sulphurascens) is the most damaging root disease of Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii) in the Pacific Northwest, USA and southwestern Canada. LRR’s influences on tree mortality and forest productivity have been well-documented in young commercial Douglas-fir forests (<50 years); however, much less is known about the role of LRR in the dynamics of older forests and how root disease might alter trajectories of forest succession. The objective of this study was to examine the association between LRR, and changes in forest community...

Wildfires are increasing in severity, frequency and size, potentially threatening freshwater species that adapted under different disturbance regimes. However, few wildfire studies have comprehensively evaluated freshwater populations and assemblages following wildfire over broad spatial scales while accounting for post-fire salvage practices in the watershed. We reveal that stream vertebrate assemblages across thirty 4th order streams, spanning a range of both watershed fire severity and post-fire forest management extent, were minimally influenced by immediate effects of fire alone...

The introduction and spread of the invasive annual grass Ventenata dubia (ventenata) has incited concern from land managers in the Inland Northwestern United States. Maps describing ventenata's distribution would be a valuable management asset but have not been developed. Techniques using satellite time-series have been used to detect annual grasses' unique phenological qualities (timing of biological events); however, detection is complicated by the co-occurrence of phenologically similar species. This study aimed to examine the capability of land surface phenology derived from fused...