Treesearch

Wildfires in the Russian boreal forest zone are estimated to typically burn 12-14 million hectares (ha) annually [Cahoon et al. 1994; Conard and Ivanova 1997; Conard et al. 2002; Dixon and Krankina 1993; Kasischke et al. 1999]. Boreal forests contain about 21 percent of global forest area and 28 percent of global forest carbon [Dixon et al. 1994], yet data on the extent and impacts of fire in these forests related to actual burning conditions are scarce and often contradictory. While seemly very remote, smoke from Siberian biomass burning can easily reach North America via long range...

As technology continues to evolve in the area of fuel and wildland fire management so does the need to have effective tools and training on these technologies. The National Interagency Fuels Coordination Group has chartered a team of professionals to coordinate, develop, and transfer consistent, efficient, science-based fuel and fire ecology assessment GIS tools and online trainings. The team is called the National Interagency Fuels, Fire, and Vegetation Technology Transfer (NIFTT). NIFTT is currently focusing on the technology development and transfer components of the National LANDFIRE...

One of the most critical decisions made on wildland fires is the identification of suitable safety zones for firefighters during daily fire management operations. To be effective (timely, repeatable, and accurate), these decisions rely on good training and judgment, but also on clear, concise guidelines. This article is a summary of safety zone guidelines and the current research efforts focused on improving firefighter safety zones, and a request for input from firefighters and fire managers.

The Fire Severity Mapping System project is geared toward providing fire managers across the western United States with critical information for dealing with and planning for the ecological effects of wildfire at multiple levels of thematic, spatial, and temporal detail. For this project, we are developing a comprehensive, west-wide map of the landscape potential for severe fire. Holden et al. (in press) demonstrated on the Gila National Forest that using satellite-derived fire severity data from the Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (MTBS, http://www.mtbs.gov) project, coupled with...

WindNinja is a simple diagnostic model designed for simulating microscale, terrain-influenced winds. A recent addition to WindNinja is a diurnal slope flow model. The model uses sensible surface heat flux, distance to ridge top or valley bottom, slope steepness, and surface and entrainment drag parameters to compute a diurnal slope wind. The diurnal wind can be combined with the ambient gradient winds. Testing of the model on a simple, hypothetical hill shows reasonable qualitative results. Fire spread simulations using FARSITE and the diurnal model show that the diurnal winds have some...

The Rx-CADRE project was the combination of local and national fire expertise in the field of core fire research. The project brought together approximately 30 fire scientists from six geographic regions and seven diff erent agencies. The project objectives were to demonstrate the capacity for collaborative research by bringing together individuals and teams with a wide range of fire monitoring expertise and equipment from across the United States and Canada in order to instrument prescribed burns in the southeastern United States. A concurrent workshop was organized that brought fire and...

Fertigation (fertilization + irrigation) is the newest way for nursery managers to apply fertilizer, and has become a standard practice in container nurseries. Because of the inherent inefficient water distribution patterns in field irrigation systems, fertigation has not been widely used in bareroot nurseries. However, a bareroot nursery with a center-pivot irrigation system has successfully used fertigation (Triebwasser and Altsuler 1995), and other nurseries have applied soluble fertilizer through a tractor -drawn sprayer. Compared to traditional fertilization with dry, granular...

In unburned forests, organic plant litter and live vegetation help stabilize the soil and promote water infiltration. Much of this plant material is consumed during severe wildfires, leaving the bare ground susceptible to elevated postfire water runoff and soil erosion (Shakesby and Doerr 2006). Severe wildfires can also produce a water-repellant layer in the soil that further decreases water infiltration (DeBano 2000). Even after moderate rain events, runoff and erosion in severely burned areas can cause extensive and costly damage to roads, buildings, reservoirs, and ecosystems (Beyers...

Successful seedling establishment following outplanting relies heavily on a seedling's ability to access soil moisture. In the Inland Northwest USA, the summer season brings drought conditions causing low soil moisture in the upper soil profile - a potentially large barrier to seedling establishment. During the 2007 growing season, three studies examined the survival, growth, and gas exchange attributes of several ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa Dougl. ex Laws.) stock types on two forest sites and on a drought stress experimental plot. These studies examined the advantages of seedling...

Pinon-juniper is a major vegetation type in western North America. Effective management of these ecosystems has been hindered by inadequate understanding of 1) the variability in ecosystem structure and ecological processes that exists among the diverse combinations of Pinons, junipers, and associated shrubs, herbs, and soil organisms; 2) the prehistoric and historic disturbance regimes; and 3) the mechanisms driving changes in vegetation structure and composition during the past 150 yr. This article summarizes what we know (and don't know) about three fundamentally different kinds of...