Treesearch

Owyhee County, Idaho, covers much of the Owyhee Uplands, an arid landscape characterized by sagebrush habitat where cattle grazing is a dominant land use. Because this landscape is home to many sensitive sagebrush-obligate species as well as species that require high-quality riparian and aquatic habitat, it has garnered attention from state and federal wildlife agencies and various nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) interested in restoring and conserving habitat on working landscapes. The installation of beaver dam-like structures such as beaver dam analogues, and the reintroduction of...

Sixty percent of family forest ownerships in the United States of America (USA) own between 0.4 and 4.0 ha (1–9 ac). Yet, little is known about this segment of family forest ownerships because they are often excluded from data collection or analyses. We utilized national data for the USA collected through the National Woodland Owner Survey to examine small-area ownerships, as well as compare attributes of this ownership group to larger-area ownerships. Small-area ownerships are less active than ownerships of greater than 4.0 ha, but not inactive. Approximately 60% of small-area ownerships...

Fungi are the primary agents of terrestrial decomposition, yet our understanding of fungal biogeography lags far behind that of plants, animals and bacteria. Here, we use a trait-based approach to quantify the niches of 23 species of basidiomycete wood decay fungi from across North America, and explore the linkages among functional trait expression, climate and phylogeny. Our analysis reveals a fundamental trade-off between abiotic stress tolerance and competitive ability, whereby fungi with wide thermal and moisture niches exhibit lower displacement ability. The magnitude of this dominance...

Restoration is underway to restore lost or degraded remnants of savanna and woodland in the Midwestern United States in the hopes of restoring floristic and wildlife diversity. Information is needed on the effects of pine savanna-woodland restoration on bird abundance to inform management decisions. We conducted point-count surveys for 19 bird species across the gradient of savanna, woodland, and forest in restored and non-restored areas throughout the Ozark-Ouachita Highlands in parts of Missouri, Arkansas, and Oklahoma during the 2013–2015 breeding seasons. We estimated densities of 16...

Chemical characterization was performed on 10 different samples of loblolly pine (Pinus taeda L.), representing the various woody components of trees (bole, slab, tops and branches, and precommercial stem-only) harvested from two naturally regenerated forests in southern Arkansas. Ultimate analysis, proximate analysis using thermogravimetry, and the energy content of the samples were determined to help evaluate their bioenergy utility. Elemental analysis revealed no significant differences between the pine tree fractions, whereas differences were observed in the proximate analysis,...

An extensive line of research has examined linkages among spatially-distinct markets. We apply semi-parametric, generalized additive vector autoregressive models to a consideration of basis linkages among North Carolina corn and soybean markets. An extensive suite of linearity test suggests that basis and price relationships are nonlinear. Marginal effects, transmission elasticities, and generalized impulse responses are utilized to describe patterns of adjustment among markets. The semi-parametric models are compared to standard threshold vector autoregressive models and are found to...

Understanding the population dynamics of migratory animals throughout the full annual cycle is critical for effective conservation, and requires knowing where populations are located throughout the year. For most Neotropical−Nearctic migratory bird species, breeding distributions are well-described, but less is generally known about their migratory paths, stopover areas, and wintering grounds. The Kirtland’s warbler Setophaga kirtlandii is an endangered longdistance migratory passerine with a restricted but well-described breeding distribution located primarily in Michigan (USA), with...

This proactive conservation strategy addresses the unique situation of limber pine in the Greater Rocky Mountain National Park Area (GRMNPA). The target area includes Rocky Mountain National Park and surrounding areas of northern Colorado and southern Wyoming. The GRMNPA is at the infection front for white pine blister rust (WPBR) where populations were also impacted by the recent mountain pine beetle epidemic and are threatened by climate change. This is the first proactive conservation strategy for a five-needle pine species in North America. It focuses on timing specific monitoring...

Increasing interest in utilization of forest biomass for bioenergy has prompted extensive contemporary research regarding costs, supply and technology for efficiently producing electricity and other forms of renewable energy. One challenge facing both researchers and users is obtaining precise estimates of available forest biomass within plausible supply areas for individual power plants. Due to the wide distribution of power plants poised to co-fire with forest biomass, assessing its availability requires methods that can yield precise and low-bias estimates of aboveground forest biomass...

Previous examination of rain gauge observations over a five-year period at high elevations within a river basin of the southern Appalachian Mountains showed that half of the extreme (upper 2.5%) rainfall events were associated with an atmospheric river (AR). Of these extreme events having an AR association, over 73% were linked to a societal hazard at downstream locations in eastern Tennessee and western North Carolina. Our analysis in this study was expanded to investigate AR effects in the southern Appalachian Mountains on two river basins, located 60 km apart, and examine their influence...