Understory

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), Forest Service is implementing silviculture and prescribed fire treatments to restore forests to their historical structures and compositions in the northern Blue Mountains of northeastern Oregon and southeastern Washington in the Wallowa-Whitman and Umatilla National Forests. This project uses noninvasive methods (trail cameras and audio recording units) and traditional wildlife sampling techniques (radio telemetry and searching for and checking nests) to develop the tools and understanding needed to monitor wildlife communities and predict their res...

This manual documents data collection procedures, codes, standards, and definitions used by the Pacific Northwest Research Station, Forest Inventory and Analysis (PNW-FIA) program in the 2025 annual forest inventory of California, Oregon, and Washington.

As part of the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program (CFLRP), USDA Forest Service Region 6 is implementing silviculture and prescribed-fire treatments to restore forests to historical structure and composition in the northern Blue Mountains of the Pacific Northwest on the Wallowa-Whitman and Umatilla National Forests. In 2021, we began a pilot monitoring effort to evaluate the efficacy of using passive acoustic recording units (ARUs) to monitor white-headed woodpecker (Picoides albolarvatus, hereafter WHWO) habitat use, and we demonstrated that ARUs are more efficient and more eff...

Western redcedar is an iconic tree species in the Pacific Northwest, with deep cultural, economic, and ecological ties in the region. However, recent elevated rates of WRC dieback have raised concern about the future of this species under changing climate conditions. This fact sheet summarizes recent work assessing the dieback period from 2015-2018 in the Pacific Northwest and highlights management considerations.

The MC2 dynamic global vegetation model (DGVM) simulates ecosystem processes and their response to climate change. It has been used in a wide range of climate model and assessment applications, from fire severity to the economics of timber harvest. This fact sheet offers a brief summary of the model itself along with a sample of the range of work MC2 has been used in.

Outbreaks of defoliator insects (insects that feed on the needles and leaves of plants) play a major role in shaping Pacific coastal temperate rainforests. This fact sheet outlines how researchers are using historical data and an ensemble machine learning model to better understand the factors influencing outbreaks of two major defoliator species in the Pacific Northwest and Southeast Alaska, and how climate change may be changing those factors.

Effective beginning 5/30/2025This website, and all linked websites under the control of the agency, is under review and content may change.A climate change vulnerability assessment, or CCVA, is a report that synthesizes and evaluates a wide range of scientific information, including model projections and scientific papers, on the effects climate change might have on a specific area. This fact sheet summarizes the main parts and uses of a CCVA, and highlights the role WWETAC plays in producing many of the assessments for the Western U.S. It also includes an up-to-date list of WWETAC's available...

Compiled abstracts of the 2024 National Silviculture Workshop, sponsored by the U.S. Forest Service, July 16-18, 2024, at the Greater Tacoma Convention Center in Tacoma, WA.

The UPstream Regional LiDAR Model for Extent of Trout (UPRLIMET) research project provides scientific information about where fish are located within Oregon, Washington, and northern California by predicting the upper limit of fish presence in streams. The USDA Forest Service Pacific Northwest Research Station and Oregon State University serve as the science leads. With an all-lands approach and partners from the Tribal federal, state, and private sectors, the project’s data and maps about fish distribution serve as useful tools for forest managers, stewards, and policymakers.

The Postfire Research and Monitoring Playbook seeks to increase awareness among those conducting postfire research and monitoring in Oregon. This will facilitate efficient investment of resources and promote leveraging or direct collaboration among various organizations responsible for fire prevention, mitigation, restoration, research, and monitoring. The collaborative postfire research and monitoring project focuses on Oregon and the fires experienced in 2020, but it will create a resource to be utilized for postfire recovery after future fires in the state.The goal of this playbook is to pr...