Articles

Forest managers have continued challenges with exotic plant species following timber harvest. A new project looks at understory responses for seven years post-timber harvest across ten timber sales on the Black Hills National Forest.

Researchers are working to get ahead of smooth brome invasion and determine management options for both the public and private land managers.

Fire-managed forests of the past provide an alternative option for management.

Ongoing work with the belowground plant community is improving our insights into ecological theory to provide managers with a more comprehensive picture of nutrient acquisition and storage from a whole-plant perspective.

What can ranch managers expect in terms of forage quality after prescribed fire in the Great Plains? Initial findings from a new comprehensive study in the mixed grass prairie detail how adaptive management can help.

Producers are dealing with swings in forage availability for their livestock. A new resource called the South Dakota Drought Tool supports increased efficiency in herd production.

A new project reconstructs the historical vegetation of Kentucky - without frequent surface fires, fire-tolerant oaks have experienced a severe decline.

National Forests and Grasslands currently are estimated to store around 57 percent of their carbon potential. Planting riparian forests can more than double initial carbon accumulation rates versus natural regeneration, suggesting restoration of these areas can be highly impactful for land managers.

Western Forbs synthesizes knowledge gained from decades of research and practical experience with more than 50 native forb species.

Historical fire regimes are a useful but imperfect guide to future management for ecological integrity. Direct plant and animal data, where available, can reveal management targets that historical estimates alone would miss.

Armillaria root disease is widespread across western North American forests, in part because it is hard to detect before significant damage has already occurred. Fortunately, thanks to advances in DNA sequencing, just a teaspoon of soil now opens up a giant window into the complex ecosystems of microbes, revealing potential management strategies.

SlashScan is a new mobile application for iPhone and iPad that field-going foresters, fuels managers, and contractors can use to simultaneously estimate slash pile volume and generate location data in real time without additional equipment.

For 25 years, ranchers in South Dakota have used the South Dakota Drought Tool to estimate forage productivity of grazing lands. This crucial information helps them gauge whether to increase or decrease their herd size the following year.

Ecological restoration and fuel hazard reduction are compatible—variable retention treatments that create structural heterogeneity for wildlife and plant diversity can achieve substantial fire behavior reductions when surface fuels and small trees are treated.

We show that commonly used stream restoration practices can increase riparian soil carbon stocks. These gains in carbon were only seen when restoration also increased soil moisture. While elevated moisture can also stimulate methane emissions, these emissions did not offset the climate benefit of increased soil carbon.

Precipitation can impact correlations between leaf functional traits and associations between these traits and gene expression.

Understanding the processes involved in polyploid formation are critical in assessing plant abilities to adapt to the unprecedented rates of environmental change. Our study provides support that Artemisia and likely other plants have dual pathways, described as one- and two-step. Our study provides further support for a paradigm in which polyploidy is an important, recurrent mechanism in generating genomic diversity, occurring on generational timescales.

Rather than maximizing partner involvement in coproduction at all stages of the research process, we emphasize designing collaborative processes that enhance partner buy-in and research relevance and impact while acknowledging resource constraints. Because researchers recognized that excessive involvement could create undue burdens, leading to collaboration fatigue and logistical challenges. Non-researchers were engaged most heavily during research interpretation, and the dissemination and application phases.

When it comes to rationing recreation opportunities, visitors have varied preferences and different user groups will benefit depending on the approach used.

A long term project helps managers influence the development of western larch forests by identifying the long-term effects of hot versus cool prescribed burns on duff reduction and later conifer recruitment.