Treesearch

Violence is a leading cause of death and disability in the United States and abroad, with far-reaching consequences for individuals and communities. Interventions that address environmental and social contexts have the potential for greater populationwide effects, yet research has been slow to identify and rigorously evaluate these types of interventions to reduce violence. Several urban communities across the US are conducting experimental and quasi-experimental communitybased research to examine the effect of place-based interventions on violence. Using examples from Philadelphia,...

Background: The negative impacts of the exotic tree, Ailanthus altissima (tree-of-heaven, stink tree), is spreading throughout much of the Eastern United States. When forests are disturbed, it can invade and expand quickly if seed sources are nearby. Methods: We conducted studies at the highly dissected Tar Hollow State Forest (THSF) in southeastern Ohio USA, where Ailanthus is widely distributed within the forest, harvests have been ongoing for decades, and prescribed fire had been applied to about a quarter of the study area. Our intention was to develop models to evaluate the relationshi...

Background: Knowledge of historical fire regimes informs the restoration of woodland communities. In the Appalachian Plateau of Ohio and Kentucky, USA, little is known about the long-term history of fire in oak–pine communities, which are declining in the region. To address this knowledge gap, two sites with remnant fire-scarred yellow pines, Hatton Ridge in Kentucky and McAtee Run in Ohio, were studied to document aspects of the historical fire regime. Cross-sections from fire-scarred yellow pines were collected. Fire chronologies were constructed and fire intervals were calculated using...

This paper introduces a Special Collection of 18 previously published articles in Landscape and Urban Planning and its parent journals on the topic of visual landscape quality assessment. To characterize the field and select papers for the collection we used automated and manual searches of the literature and the entire back catalog of this journal (1974–2018). Our analysis identifies and describes six thematic categories: conceptual and theoretical foundations, visual quality assessments, visual impact assessments, extension of visual assessments beyond scenic concerns, integration of...

Treatments to reduce shrub cover are commonly implemented with the objective of shifting community structure away from shrub dominance and toward shrub and perennial grass codominance. In sagebrush (Artemisia L.) ecosystems, shrub reduction treatments have had variable effects on target shrubs, herbaceous perennials, and non-native annual plants. The factors mediating this variability are not well understood. We used long-term data from Utah’s Watershed Restoration Initiative project to assess short-term (1 - 4 yr post-treatment) and long-term (5 - 12 yr post-treatment) responses of...

Intraspecific trait variation can be substantial and is driven by many factors. To develop predictive models of intraspecific trait variation, an understanding of the drivers of that variation is essential. At fairly broad scales, differences in the environment are expected to drive genetic variation in functional traits among populations. To isolate this genetic variability, we conducted a greenhouse common garden experiment using nine grass species native to the western United States. We assessed relationships between several root, leaf, and whole plant traits and a number of environmenta...

Factors influencing sediment availability are assessed and erosion rates are quantified for an offhighway vehicle (OHV) trail system in the Ouachita Mountains of Arkansas. As of May 2012, the Wolf Pen Gap trail system included 77.0 km of "trails" which consist of county roads; open and closed Forest Service roads; and open and closed OHV trails. For a given trail length, the sediment volume available to be eroded is determined by bare trail width and sediment depth. Four condition types are defined that group trail sections based on statistically different trail widths or depths. Trail...

Upper Board Camp Creek (BCC) in western Arkansas drains the Wolf Pen Gap (WPG) Trail Complex, a designated Off-Highway Vehicle (OHV) area in use since the 1990s. The mixed bedrock-alluvial channel is quite active, with extensive bars and eroding banks present within the higher-order, main-valley channels. This study was conducted to determine the relative magnitudes of sediment storage and production within the channel, and whether geomorphic changes are synchronous with establishment and increasing OHV use levels on the trail system. Fourteen geomorphically active reaches within the...

Wildland firefighters engaged in fire suppression activities are often exposed to hazardous air pollutants such as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and particulate matter (PM2.5) during wildfires with no respiratory protection. Although the most significant exposures to smoke likely occur on the fireline, wildland firefighters may also be exposed at the incident command post (ICP), an area designated for wildfire suppression support operations. Our objective was to characterize exposures of PAHs and PM2.5 near an ICP during a wildfire event in California. We collected area air...

The restoration of native forbs in the Great Basin and similar dryland ecosystems remains a great challenge for land managers. Variable soil water, precocious germination and emergence, and the presence of soil fungal pathogens often reduce plant establishment. Novel restoration treatments that increase soil water during early forb life stages, delay germination and emergence to coincide with favorable spring conditions, and reduce mortality from soil fungal pathogens may benefit native forb restoration. We compared the efficacy of three novel treatments - snow fencing, plant protection...