Treesearch

Over millennia, many indigenous and Tribal peoples in North America's fire-prone ecosystems developed sophisticated relationships with wildland fire that continue today. This article introduces philosophical, conceptual, and operational approaches to working with American Indians through research and management partnerships in the fields of wildland fire, forestry, and fuels, with applications to climate change and forest landscape restoration strategies. Of central importance are respectful collaborative relationships among the various parties (Tribes, agencies, organizations, academics,...

Background Karuk and Yurok tribes in northwestern California, USA, are revitalizing the practice of cultural burning, which is the use of prescribed burns to enhance culturally important species. These cultural burns are critical to the livelihoods of indigenous peoples, and were widespread prior to the establishment of fire exclusion policies. One of the major objectives of cultural burning is to enhance California hazelnut (Corylus cornutaMarsh var. californica) basketry stem production for Karuk and Yurok basketweavers. To evaluate cultural burning as a form of human ecosystem engineerin...

Forest ecosystems are increasingly affected by a range of tree mortality events, which may permanently alter forest functional traits and disrupt their ecosystem services. While individual forest disturbances are well studied, interactions between multiple disturbances and changes of spatial patterns of forested landscapes are rarely quantified. In this study, we aim to analyze the role of wildfire in the Big Sur ecoregion of California on the spread of Phytophthora ramorum, an invasive pathogen which causes sudden oak death, the most important driver of mortality across 1000 km of...

The twentieth century confluence of clear-cutting, deer overabundance, and rising nitrogen deposition favored dominance by the shadeintolerant, unpalatable, and nitrogen-demanding black cherry (Prunus serotina) throughout the Allegheny Plateau of the eastern United States. The abundance of this species conferred unique and valuable ecological and economic benefits that shaped regional biodiversity and societies. Sustaining these values is increasingly difficult because black cherry, seemingly inexplicably, has experienced diminished establishment, growth, and survival in the twenty-first...

Native bark beetles and wildfires are important disturbances in western coniferous forests. We consider two common interactions between bark beetles and wildfires (1) the effects of fuel reduction treatments (prescribed fire and mechanical thinning) and wildfires on bark beetles, and (2) the effects of bark beetle epidemics and associated levels of tree mortality on fuels and wildfire behavior and severity. We briefly describe the current state of knowledge and identify gaps for making informed management decisions.

Group harvesting is often used to regenerate mid-tolerant tree species. However, in managed northern hardwood forests of the Great Lakes region, regeneration failures are common among mid-tolerant species regardless of gap size. Coppicing advance regeneration has the potential to alter recruitment patterns within harvest gaps, as some mid-tolerant species have large dormant season carbohydrate reserves in the root system. However, the comparative sprouting abilities of northern hardwood saplings are not well quantified. Furthermore, variation in light availability and chronic browsing from...

This study was established to evaluate underplanting as a method of reestablishing a shortleaf pine (Pinus echinata Mill.) component to a dry upland hardwood stand in the Piedmont region of the southeastern United States. Replicated treatment plots were harvested to retain four levels (approximately 0, 3, 7, and 10 m2 of basal area per hectare) of residual overstory density. One-year-old containerized seedlings with both smaller (93.4 cm3) and larger (113.1 cm3) plugs and bareroot seedlings were underplanted beneath the residual overstory treatments. After five growing seasons, seedling...

Runoff and erosion processes can increase after wildfire and post‐fire salvage logging, but little is known about the specific effects of soil compaction and surface cover after post‐fire salvage logging activities on these processes. We carried out rainfall simulations after a high‐severity wildfire and post‐fire salvage logging to assess the effect of compaction (uncompacted or compacted by skid traffic during post‐fire salvage logging) and surface cover (bare or covered with logging slash). Runoff after 71 mm of rainfall across two 30‐min simulations was similar for the bare plots...

Alaska is among northern high‐latitude regions where accelerated climate change is expected to impact streamflow properties, including seasonality and primary flow drivers. Evaluating changes to streamflow, including flood characteristics, across this large and diverse environment can be improved by identifying the distribution and influence of flow drivers. Using metrics of mean monthly streamflow data from 253 streamgages, seasonal flow regimes were clustered to guide identification of seasonal flow drivers and form hydrologic groups for identification of peak‐flow populations. Nine...

This publication describes a large collection of gravel bedload transport measurements taken in numerous small Rocky Mountain streams (the database is available at https://www.fs.fed.us/biology/nsaec/projects-bedloadtraps.html). The database was developed for gravel bedload data collected between 1998 and 2015 during 14 campaigns at 12 field sites in 9 Rocky Mountain streams in Colorado and Wyoming and 1 stream in the Cascade Mountains in eastern Oregon. The data were collected with bedload traps - large, unflared samplers that had been specially developed to obtain representative samples...