Treesearch

Chinese tallow is a non-native invasive tree expanding in range and abundance throughout the southern United States. Several biogeographical studies mapping tallow distribution and examining key underlying environmental factors relied on the U.S. Forest Service Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) data, representing forestlands at scales of ~2400 ha. However, given that most invasive trees, like tallow, are cosmopolitan and dynamic in nature, FIA data fails to capture the extent and severity of the invasion especially outside areas classified as forestlands. To develop tallow maps that more...

Naturally durable wood pre-dates preservative-treated wood and has been demonstrated to offer a suitable service life for certain applications where preservative-treated wood is not feasible. Heartwood extractives have been demonstrated to impart bio-deteriorative resistance to naturally durable wood species. These extractives are typically found in the heartwood of living trees and are produced either by the death of parenchyma cells or as the result of external stimuli. The mechanisms of natural durability are not well understood, as heartwood extractives can be extremely variable in...

The effective monitoring and identification of existing subterranean termite populations within coarse woody debris and infested wood in service depend on accurate detection. These insects are often concealed within logs, wooden support structures, walls, and floorboards of buildings. In the absence of external mud tubes, termite infestations normally must be discovered through the destructive exploration of wooden structures to reveal the physical presence of these insect pests. Subterranean termite species are difficult to identify due to similarities in morphological features, but they...

Federal agencies responsible for wildland fire management face increasing needs for personnel as fire seasons lengthen and fire size continues to grow, yet federal agencies have struggled to recruit and retain firefighting personnel. While many have speculated that long seasons, challenging working conditions, and low wages contribute to recruitment and retention challenges, there has been no empirical investigation of these claims. We assemble a unique dataset on the federally funded Interagency Hotshot Crews in the Western United States, which are comprised of highly qualified firefighter...

Background: As fire regimes are changing and wildfire disasters are becoming more frequent, the term megafire is increasingly used to describe impactful wildfires, under multiple meanings, both in academia and popular media. This has resulted in a highly ambiguous concept.Approach: We analysed the use of the term 'megafire' in popular media to determine its origin, its developments over time, and its meaning in the public sphere. We subsequently discuss how relative the term 'mega' is, and put this in the context of an analysis of Portuguese and global data on fire size distribution.Results...

Pyrolysis is a combustion process of woody biomass conducted under low or no oxygen conditions. It converts any kind of biomass into biochar, bio-oil, or biogas. Hence plants’ woody material can also be converted into bioenergy products. Valorization of woody biomass in the form of energy-rich compound biochar is a more sustainable technique as compared to conventional burning which leads to toxicity to the environment. Innovations and the need to limit open burning have resulted in numerous mobile and fixed plant pyrolysis methods that burn a variety of woody residues. Production technolog...

Biochar production from woody biomass generated during forest management (slash) offers significant benefits for soil health and carbon emissions, yet its adoption remains limited in the western United States (U.S.). To address this challenge, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (U.S.D.A.) Forest Service Rocky Mountain Research Station organized two workshops focused on forest management-centric biochar production. These workshops convened a diverse group of stakeholders, including investors, land management practitioners, industry professionals, and research scientists, each with unique...

Soil carbon-nitrogen (C:N) stoichiometry acts as a control over decomposition and soil organic matter formation and loss, making it a key soil property for understanding ecosystem dynamics and projected ecosystems responses to global environmental change. However, the controls of soil C:N and how they respond to increasing pressures from global change agents are not fully understood. The “foundational” controls on soil C:N, namely plant and microbial C:N, have been used to predict soil C:N, but fail to accurately simulate all ecosystems and may be insufficient for predictions under global...

Fuel and restoration treatments seeking to mitigate the likelihood of uncharacteristic high-severity wildfires in forests with historically frequent, low-severity fire regimes are increasingly common, but long-term treatment effects on fuels, aboveground carbon, plant community structure, ecosystem resilience, and other ecosystem attributes are understudied. We present 20-year responses to thinning and prescribed burning treatments commonly used in dry, low-elevation forests of the western United States from a long-term study site in the Northern Rockies that is part of the National Fire...

Climate is changing faster than long-lived species, such as forest trees, can migrate or adapt, risking adverse impacts on tree growth and forest composition (Aitken et al., 2008; Alberto et al., 2013; Sittaro et al., 2017). Nevertheless, current forest management and restoration tools, from tree breeding and seed zones to growth and yield models, assume a stable climate and that local sources are the best adapted (McKay et al., 2005; Bucharova et al., 2017; Alía et al., 2022; Park and Rodgers, 2023). Increasing frequency and severity of extreme events, including heat waves, drought, pest...