Visualizing long-term forest recovery after management and wildfire at Miller Creek Demonstration Forest

Abstract

Located on the Flathead National Forest in northwestern Montana, Miller Creek Demonstration Forest (Miller Creek) was an early showcase of the multidisciplinary science and management that now characterizes forest management on public lands (DeByle 1981). Original research was started in the Miller Creek drainage in 1966 as a controlled operational-scale experiment on the use of prescribed fire as a site preparation technique in the ecologically and economically important moist Rocky Mountain mixed-conifer forests (Abies lasiocarpa / Clintonia uniflora habitat type; Pfister et al. 1977) of the northern Rockies (figure 1). After decades of research, the site was officially established as a Demonstration Forest in 1989 via an internal U.S. Forest Service Memorandum of Understanding between the Supervisor of the Flathead National Forest and the Director of the Intermountain Research Station (now the Rocky Mountain Research Station).

Citation

Williams, Neil G.; Crotteau, Justin S.; Wright, David K.; Underwood, Adele; Stickney, Peter F. 2023. Visualizing long-term forest recovery after management and wildfire at Miller Creek Demonstration Forest. Journal of Forestry. 121: 292-296.