Treesearch

Pinon-Juniper (PJ) ecosystems cover approximately 30 million ha in the western United States (West 1999). High variability in species assemblages and structure exists across this large geographic range, driven in part by varying climate. Among the three functional PJ types (persistent PJ woodlands, PJ savannas, and PJ shrublands), the least is known about ecosystem processes and vegetation dynamics in PJ ecosystems containing a substantial grass component - PJ savannas (Romme et al. 2009).

Pinyon Jays and piñon pines have a mutualism whereby the trees provide mast crops of highly nutritional seeds that enhance the jays’ population viability (Marzluff and Balda 1992), and the jays cache the seeds, serving as the tree’s main long-distance seed disperser (Ligon 1978). Breeding Bird Survey data indicate that Pinyon Jay populations have been declining for 50 years (Sauer et al. 2014), and they are currently the fastest-declining Pinon-Juniper bird species (Boone et al. in press). Ongoing decline of the piñon tree’s main seed disperser will limit the potential of the trees to...

Characterization of shifts in regional hydroclimatic conditions helps reduce negative consequences on agriculture, environment, economy, society, and ecosystem. This study assesses shifts in regional hydroclimatic conditions across the conterminous United States in response to climate change over the 21st century. The hydrological responses of five downscaled climate models from the Multivariate Adaptive Constructed Analogs data set ranging from the driest to wettest and least warm to hottest were simulated using the variable infiltration capacity (VIC) model. Shifts in regional hydroclimat...

Changes in CO2 concentration and climate are likely to alter disturbance regimes and competitive outcomes among tree species, which ultimately can result in shifts of species and biome boundaries. Such changes are already evident in high latitude forests, where waterlogged soils produced by topography, surficial geology, and permafrost are an important driver of forest dynamics. Predicting such effects under the novel conditions of the future requires models with direct and mechanistic links of abiotic drivers to growth and competition. We enhanced such a forest landscape model (PnET-Succes...

The 2012 Planning Rule requires that National Forest planning teams provide for a transparent, collaborative process that allows effective public participation, but there is no roadmap for how to be successful. A recent General Technical Report describes how Q methodology can collect stakeholder input in a way that is engaging, thorough, and scientifically rigorous. This process can help forest planners identify different perspectives as well as areas of agreement by stakeholders, including the public.

Mexican spotted owl habitat varies by geographic location. In the Sacramento Mountains, percent cover of mixed-conifer forest was strongly associated with the likelihood of Mexican spotted owl occurrence, whereas topography was key in the Mogollon Plateau.

A comprehensive general technical report summarizes essential information on the status and ecology of the Mexican spotted owl found in the Upper Gila Mountains Recovery Unit which supports a majority of the known population. Many of the recommendations in the 2011 report were adopted when the Mexican Spotted Owl Recovery Plan created in 1995 was updated in 2012. Recent research adds to the existing knowledge with improved understanding about owl demography and ecology, spatial distribution and connectivity of owl habitat, wildfire trends in owl habitat, and regional differences in ecology.

The FireCLIME VA tool, found at https://swfireclime.org/ vulnerability-assessment, is a new resource that allows land managers to compare management strategies under various climate scenarios and to gauge the potential effectiveness of those strategies for reducing undesirable impacts of climate on wildfire regimes and resulting impacts of wildfire on natural ecosystems.

New translation process corrects past translation error and allows FVS to directly read FIA data without the need for data conversion by the FVS user. Managers and researchers can now more easily and effectively assess the status and trends of a wide variety of forest types over large areas. They can evaluate the outcomes of possible future management scenarios. Data availability in the new format allows users to project data from FIA plots, subplots, or conditions.

Determining the best strategy to ensure the survival of an endangered desert plant species near the Utah-Arizona border required combining many approaches including genetic and lifecycle analysis, field experiments, and habitat modeling based on high-resolution drone imagery.