Treesearch

Around the world, youth are recognized as playing an important role in reducing the risk of disasters and promoting community resilience. Youth are participating in disaster education programs and carrying home what they learn; their families, in turn, are disseminating knowledge into the community. In addition to making a difference today, youth disaster education programs train the adults of tomorrow to be more prepared citizens. As social scientists and education researchers working in wildfire risk mitigation, we asked: how can wildfire education programs for youth help develop and...

Around the world, youth are recognized as playing an important role in reducing the risk of disasters and promoting community resilience. Youth are participating in disaster education programs and carrying home what they learn; their families, in turn, are disseminating knowledge into the community. Youth are also collecting data and doing actual mitigation work that furthers the ability of homeowners and organizations to take appropriate action to address wildfire risk. In addition to making a difference today, youth disaster education programs train the adults of tomorrow to be more...

Northern red oak occurs in limited amounts with a mixture of softwoods on the shallow soils at upper elevations in northern New England. These stands are important for wildlife habitat and forest diversity as well as a modest amount of timber harvesting. Little experience or research is available on how to regenerate upper-elevation oak. However, an examination of a 35-year-old clearcut on an upper slope of the Bartlett Experimental Forest reveals successful oak regeneration. We describe the species mix and tree sizes in the clearcut stand, the species composition and advanced oak regenerat...

This study integrates two existing computer programs, the Pest Vulnerability Matrix and i-Tree Streets, into a decision-support tool for assessing municipal forest stability and recommending strategies to mitigate risk of loss. A report card concept was developed to communicate levels of performance in terms that managers and the public easily understand. Grades were assigned to four aspects of a stable and resilient municipal forest: Species Dominance, Age Structure, Pest Threat and Potential Asset Loss. The data pool of 29 California municipal forest inventories contained information on...

Measurements of urban tree canopy cover are crucial for managing urban forests and required for the quantification of the benefits provided by trees. These types of data are increasingly used to secure funding and justify large-scale planting programs in urban areas. Comparisons of tree canopy measurement methods have been conducted before, but a rapidly evolving set of new technologies and applications may leave urban foresters wondering, "Which method is most appropriate for my circumstances?" This analysis compares two well-established measures of local tree canopy and building cover...

Water quantity and quality data were compared from six headwater watersheds on two distinct soil formations, Carolina Slate Belt (CSB) and Triassic Basins (TB). CSB soils are generally thicker, less erodible, and contain less clay content than soils found in TB. TB generated significantly more discharge/precipitation ratio than CSB (0.33 vs. 0.24) in the 2009 dormant season. In the 2009 growing season, TB generated significantly less discharge/precipitation ratio than CSB (0.02 vs. 0.07). Over the entire monitoring period, differences in discharge/precipitation ratios between CSB and TB...

We sampled trees grown with and without competing vegetation control in an 11-year-old Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii var. menziesii (Mirb.) Franco) plantation on a highly productive site in southwestern Washington to create diameter based allometric equations for estimating individual-tree bole, branch, foliar, and total aboveground biomass. We used these equations to estimate per-hectare aboveground biomass, nitrogen (N), and carbon (C) content, and compared these results to (1) estimates based on biomass equations published in other studies, and (2) estimates made using the mean-tree...

China is facing a growing water crisis due to climate and land use change, and rise in human water demand across this rapidly developing country. Understanding the spatial and temporal ecohydrologic responses to climate change is critical to sustainable water resource management. We investigated water yield (WY) responses to historical (1981–2000) and projected potential climate changes across a large and complex climatic and land cover gradients over the North–South Transect of Eastern China (NSTEC, a standard terrestrial transect of the International GeoBiological Project, IGBP). After...

As publicly owned forest land, the Morgan-Monroe and Yellowwood State Forests (Indiana), referred to herein as the Morgan-Monroe Yellowwood Complex (MMYC), have many stakeholders with differing management expectations. The Hardwood Ecosystem Experiment (HEE) within the MMYC will significantly increase the science-based information available for forest management decisions. The primary focus of HEE is the impacts of alternative timber management systems on associated communities of flora and fauna. The results will be used to evaluate tradeoffs associated with mixes of silvicultural...

Over the next century, the Hardwood Ecosystem Experiment (HEE) in Indiana will provide numerous opportunities for collaborative research on how forest management affects the ecological, economic, and social resources of southern Indiana. Here, we highlight the pre-treatment research conducted at the HEE sites from 2006 through 2008 and discuss the role that pre-treatment differences among experimental units and/or treatments may have on future research activities. We then formulate hypotheses about the effects of the various silvicultural regimes on communities monitored for the duration...