Treesearch

The Wildfire Research Center (WiRe Center) works with wildfire practitioners seeking to create communities that are adapted to wildfire using an evidenced-based approach. Historically, immediate threats and wildfire suppression have garnered much attention and resources. While these efforts remain critical, getting in front of the problem by promoting pathways to fire adaptation is of paramount importance. Fire adaptation is about living with wildfire. It’s about creating safe and resilient communities that reduce wildfire risk on properties before a fire and supporting effective response...

Estimating baseline carbon stocks is a key step in designing forest carbon programs. While field inventories are resource-demanding, advances in predictive modeling are now providing globally coterminous datasets of carbon stocks at high spatial resolutions that may meet this data need. However, it remains unknown how well baseline carbon stock estimates derived from model data compare against conventional estimation approaches such as field inventories. Furthermore, it is unclear whether site-level management actions can be designed using predictive model data in place of field measurement...

Issues with land ownership and engagement in forestry have been intractable problems that have long impeded wealth development among African Americans in the rural South. Over a 6-year period, an integrated outreach and research program, the Sustainable Forestry and African American Land Retention Program, implemented communitybased projects, built networks among relevant organizations, changed policies, and developed new knowledge to address these critical issues of environmental justice. In this paper, we discuss how anthropological practice was integrated into a program of community-base...

Hydric forest communities within the Tampa Bay Watershed were inventoried to assess the effect of urbanization on these systems. Based on aerial photography and site visits, 85 hydric plots were assigned a legacy class—remnant (forest, pre-1948), emergent (forest, post 1948), and managed (actively managed grass on plot). On each plot, diameter at breast height (dbh) and canopy width and species were recorded for trees ≥2.5 cm dbh. A hierarchical agglomerative cluster analysis identified community types within a legacy class and one-way AOV (α = .05) was used to compare structural features...

The initial processes for successful biological invasions are transport, introduction, and establishment. These can be directly influenced or completely avoided through activities that reduce the number and frequency of entering nonnative propagules. Economic and environmental benefits through preventative monitoring programs at early stages of invasion far outweigh the long-term costs associated with mitigating ecological and economic impacts once nonnative species establish and spread. In this study, we identified 30 taxa of hitchhiking plant propagules on the air-intake grilles of...

Recent outbreaks of engraver beetles,Ipsspp. De Geer (Coleoptera: Curculionidae; Scolytinae), in ponderosa pine, Pinus ponderosa var. scopulorumEngelm. (Pinales: Pinaceae), forests of northern Arizona have resulted in widespread tree mortality. Current treatment options, such as spraying individualP. ponderosawith insecticides or deep watering ofP. ponderosain urban and periurban settings, are limited in applicability and scale. Thinning stands to increase tree vigor is also recommended, but appropriate timing is crucial. Antiaggregation pheromones, widely used to protect high-value trees...

Estimating changes in organic matter flow from resource to consumer using trophic basis of production (TBP) is a way to examine resource limitation effects on ecosystem function. We examined diet shifts and production of insect detritivores to assess changes with reduced detrital inputs to a forested headwater stream. Organic matter was excluded for 7 years using a canopy net. Small and large wood were removed from the stream after the 3rd and 5th year, respectively. Detritivore production declined after 3 years of litter exclusion. After wood removal, production of detritivores declined...

Mean annual temperature (MAT) is an influential climate factor affecting the bioavailability of growth‐limiting nutrients nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P). In tropical montane wet forests, warmer MAT drives higher N bioavailability, while patterns of P availability are inconsistent across MAT. Two important nutrient acquisition strategies, fine root proliferation into bulk soil and root association with arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi, are dependent on C availability to the plant via primary production. The case study presented here tests whether variation in bulk soil N bioavailability across...

We here describe a new Collembola species, Hylaeanura emiliae sp. nov., from the Luquillo Experimental Forest in Puerto Rico. We describe H. emiliae sp. nov. as a distinct species based on the enlarged sensilla s3 in antennal segment IV, the absence of modified sensorial setae in abdominal segment IV and the presence of four setae on each dens. An updated key with illustrations for the identification of worldwide species of the genus is included.

Springtails (Arthropoda, Hexapoda, Collembola) are small arthropods commonly found in soil, litter and other habitats all around the Globe. More than 9,000 species have been described worldwide, but knowledge about their diversity and distribution remains far from complete. Reports of springtail diversity in the Antilles are uneven, some islands are relatively well known, whereas others have not been explored at all. The fauna of Puerto Rico is reasonably well known, but many recent reports are scattered in published literature and unpublished theses.