Treesearch

Wildfires burn as much as ~6 % of Earth’s ice-free land annually and remove carbon (C) stored in surface soils. Prescribed burns may offer an opportunity to preserve soil C stocks by limiting the extent and severity of wildfires. However, prescribed burns in western North America are mostly conducted during short windows in the early fall season. Expanding burning to other seasons, like spring, is key to increasing effectiveness. Yet, it is not clear how burning stands in the spring versus the fall affects soil C stocks, a key consideration for managers seeking to preserve soil C. To...

Channel incision can disconnect streams from their floodplains, potentially depleting carbon (C) in riparian soils by stimulating microbial decomposition. Stream restoration may offer an opportunity to replenish soil C pools by saturating riparian soils with water and slowing microbial activity.Assess how stream restoration affects soil C persistence and greenhouse gas emissions in riparian soils.We measured soil C pools and methane (CH 4 , a strong greenhouse gas) emissions adjacent to stream reaches restored with plug‐and‐ponds or beaver dam analogs (BDAs) in northern New Mexico. We also...

When wildland firefighters head into the field, they know the work is dangerous; but until now, agencies lacked detailed data on exactly which activities and hazards posed the greatest threats. A recent analysis of five years of serious firefighter injuries offers new insights.

The USDA Forest Service is required to develop “land management plans,” which serve as roadmaps for maintaining the health and productivity of national forests and grasslands. These plans are designed to support ecological integrity, or an ecosystem’s ability to withstand environmental disturbance. One way that national forests and grasslands, or “planning units”, measure ecological integrity is by looking at the way that focal species respond to the effects of management activities and environmental changes.

For over fifty years, the Landsat satellite series has provided continuous and comprehensive data for monitoring changes on the Earth’s terrestrial surface. Eight successive missions, carrying progressively more sophisticated sensors, with improved radiometric, geometric, and spatial characteristics, have provided an unbroken series of optical and thermal imagery, unparalleled globally. With limited lifetimes for each Landsat satellite, planning of each mission typically overlaps to ensure continuity. Commencing in 2021, planning of a Landsat-9 successor gathered user needs from across the...

Until recently, wildlife habitat maps were static documents that can quickly become outdated anytime landscape conditions changed due to disturbances like wildfire, drought, and timber harvest. But now, researchers at the Rocky Mountain Research Station and their collaborators have developed an approach for producing near-real-time wildlife habitat maps using Google Earth Engine. These products are called Living Maps because of their ability to stay up to date - incorporating new input data and remaining accurate over time - thus functioning like an automated wildlife habitat monitoring...

Mature and old-growth forests (MOG) provide essential ecosystem services, yet they face increasing threats. Currently, high-intensity, high-severity wildfires are the main driver for loss of MOG on federally managed forests across the United States. Quantifying MOG forests with greatest exposure to stand-replacing wildfires provides essential information for land managers. We integrated geospatial data from fire behavior simulations (fire intensity), fire refugia prediction (fire severity), forest type mapping, and carbon estimates to assess exposure of MOG forests to stand-replacing...

Drought is expected to increase in frequency and severity due to climate change, highlighting the urgency of understanding drought impacts on wildlife across geographies and taxonomic groups. We conducted a review of peer‐reviewed articles from 1982 to 2024, focusing on the impacts of anomalous drought on terrestrial vertebrates. We recorded 3324 total wildlife responses, 188 from single‐species studies and 3136 from multi‐species studies. Within single‐species studies, 66% of responses were negative, 32% were unclear, and 2% were positive, illustrating the widespread threat of increasing...

The effects of salvage logging on runoff and sediment delivery processes are not well understood. We used rill erosion simulation experiments for 3 years after the 2013 Rim Fire to understand how post‐fire salvage logging and mitigation practises affect runoff and sediment delivery rates. We assessed soil conditions, surface cover, runoff rates and sediment delivery rates on hillslope plots that were either burned at high severity (controls) or burned at high severity with additional logging treatments including no logging traffic, few pass or many pass skid trails, and skid trails that...

Armillaria solidipes, a naturally occurring fungus, is responsible for one of the most widespread root diseases in western North American forests. Armillaria root disease affects a broad range of tree species, and by the time visible symptoms appear, significant damage has often already occurred.