Great Basin Fire Science Exchange

5th National Cohesive Wildland Fire Management Strategy Workshop
2022-11-14 - 2022-11-18
Workshop website.
This Workshop is considered “mission critical” for anyone working on these issues in local, state, Tribal and federal agencies, and organizations as well as non-governmental organizations and private companies. There is no other forum in the nation that provides these opportunities.

USFS Wildfire Crisis Strategy Roundtables: Recommendations and next steps
2022-11-14 11:00 - 12:00 (America/Los_Angeles)
Webinar recording.
In the winter and spring of 2022, the National Forest Foundation (NFF), in coordination with the USDA Forest Service, hosted a series of roundtables across the country to gather input on the Wildfire Crisis Strategy Implementation Plan. The NFF distilled these productive discussions with Forest Service employees and partners into regional reports and an overall synthesis report, available at nationalforests.org/wildfire-roundtables.
The purpose of this webinar is to share more information about the report, discuss next steps, and provide an opportunity for Q&A with Forest Service leadership.

Science x Forests USFS webinar series
2022-11-14 11:00 - 2022-11-18 12:00
Webinar recordings.

Monday, November 14 SCIENCE x Forests: Silviculture for the present and future
A compendium of silviculture treatments for forest types in the United States: Silviculture guidance to support modeling, scenario planning, and large-scale simulations, presented by Thomas Schuler
Prescribed burning considerations following mechanical treatments, presented by Sharon Hood
Reforestation in an era of megafires: A wicked problem for the Forest Service in Region 5 and elsewhere, presented by Martin Ritchie
Tuesday, November 15 SCIENCE x Forests: Forests and climate change
Preparing our forests for the future, presented by Mike Battaglia
The Pacific Northwest carbon dynamics research initiative: Co-production to assist land managers and policy makers, presented by Andrew Gray
Sink, swim, or surf: Surging climate change impacts and the role of climate-adaptive silviculture, presented by Alejandro Royo
Wednesday, November 16 SCIENCE x Forests: Innovations in forest research
From the forest to the faucet: Tools and data linking surface water from forested lands to public water systems, presented by Peter Caldwell
Cloud computing advances regional old-growth forest monitoring for the Northwest Forest Plan, presented by David M Bell
What is resilience in frequent-fire forests and how can it be measured?, presented by Malcolm North
Thursday, November 17 SCIENCE x Forests: Urban forestry, community, and wood utilization
The science and practice of urban silviculture, presented by Nancy Sonti and Rich Hallett
Expanding urban wood utilization, presented by Charlie Becker
Not by trees alone: Centering community in urban forestry, presented by Lindsay Campbell
Friday, November 18 SCIENCE x Forests: Invasion and outbreaks in forests
Species home-making in ecosystems: Toward place-based ecological metrics of belonging, presented by Susan Cordell
Invasion and outbreak within an epidemiological model, presented by Rima Lucardi
Mapping Armillaria-killed trees with high-resolution remote sensing, presented by Benjamin Bright

The hydrology of western juniper in central Oregon
2022-11-15 12:00 - 13:00
Webinar recording.
Dr. Carlos Ochoa’s research focuses on connections between ecohydrological processes and human interactions in an ever-changing climate. Dr. Ochoa has numerous research projects, one of which is a long term study in central Oregon that has provided critical information regarding vegetation and hydrology interactions in western juniper dominated landscapes. This presentation will discuss some of the learnings from Dr. Ochoa’s work on western juniper.

Communication strategies for range professionals - A webinar series
2022-11-17 12:00 - 13:00
Webinar recording.
How will you deliver your message to the right people?
Rangeland professionals know a lot about rangeland ecology and management, but not about marketing, especially online communication. Online communication is here to stay, investing time now to learn more about it will prepare you for the future.

Increases in large wildfire driven nighttime fire activity observed across the conterminous US
2022-12-06 11:00 - 12:00
Webinar recording.
This presentation discusses the results of 17 years of active fire data from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) to characterize the daytime and nighttime dynamics of wildfires across the continental US. Whereas daytime fire activity was widely detected regardless of fire type, nighttime fire activity was mainly detected inside wildfires and particularly within large wildfires in the western US. The analysis also found that as fuels dry, there is an increase in larger and more intense wildfires with higher chances that fire activity will persist overnight. Results indicate that increasing trends in nighttime wildfire activity have coincided with increasing wildfire sizes. Nighttime fire activity already poses additional risks to firefighters and communities, and this presentation discussed the probability that projected increases in the frequency of large wildfires will be accompanied by increases in the extent and intensity of nighttime fire activity.

Geo-Fencing Summit
2022-12-07 10:00 - 2022-12-08 15:00
Day 1 Recording
Day 2 Recording

Summit hosts: Matt Reeves – Rocky Mountain Research Station and Dwayne Rice – Region 2 Rangeland Program Manager
Background: Geo-fencing provides some unique advantages over conventional fencing approaches. This is especially true when we consider the devastation to fencing, and other rangeland infrastructure, caused by wildfires. Geo-fencing is increasingly used with public land grazing leases, but the cost-effectiveness of geo-fencing and common challenges are not well understood. Issues such as cost-effectiveness, environmental concerns, animal welfare, and system efficacy remain unclear.
In this Summit, we provide a forum for producers, managers, and USDA Forest Service agency leadership to share their insights, successes, and failures while answering questions in the process. Geo-fencing may have a significant role to play in the future of public land management. In this Summit, we provide a backdrop against which we can come to some common understanding of what the technology affords including the considerations needed prior to implementation.
Summit Scope & Components: The objective is to enable Summit participants to learn from the real-world experience provided by managers, agency leaders, and producers. In this Summit, we discuss geo-fencing through a series of coupled 20-minute presentations followed by a 30-minute live question-and-answer session. In this manner, we aim to engage participants from a wide range of experiences and disciplines.
Deliverables & Benefits:

The meeting itself. It provides an important means of information exchange where we can all learn from each other.
Recorded 20-minute presentations that can be revisited remotely anytime.
Identification of new partnerships between producers, managers, and researchers to foster more effective land management strategies to be developed across more regions.

Rising from the ashes: Post-fire regeneration management strategies from recent Front Range fires
2022-12-07 12:00 - 13:00
Webinar recording.

Geomorphic recovery and post-fire flooding implications following the 2019 Museum Fire
2023-01-18 12:00 - 13:00
Webinar recording.
The 2019 Museum Fire burned nearly 2,000 acres of steep forested terrain abutting Flagstaff city limits in northern Arizona. In addition to the immediate fire danger, post-fire flooding posed a significant threat to the downstream community and critical infrastructure, prompting a multi-agency cooperation to evaluate post-fire runoff and geomorphic change during the recovery period (Fall 2019 to present). Uniquely, the burn scar experienced two record-dry monsoons in 2019 and 2020 with minor runoff, followed by a significantly wet monsoon in 2021 resulting in multiple post-fire flow events and damage to areas identified to be at risk. The timing of these flow events proves relatively rare as most burn scars in the Southwest experience their first major runoff events between a few weeks and months following fire, with severity of runoff events generally decreasing with time as the scar recovers. This presentation provides a detailed, multi-year documentation of geomorphic change and recovery in the Museum burn scar throughout its unusual recovery history. Additionally, in response to the 2021 flood events, flood mitigation structures were constructed on the floodplain below the Museum scar; the impact of 2022 monsoonal runoff on these structures is currently being evaluated in context with watershed recovery and will be available for future discussion.

Fire and wildlife
2023-01-19 08:00 - 09:00
Webinar registration.
The good, bad, and ugly of fire and wildlife – roasty toasty critters or promoting sustainable habitat for expanding and healthy wildlife populations? Let’s discuss the pros and cons of fire on wildlife. How is the lack of fire at the necessary scale, frequency, intensity/severity, and seasonality one of the greatest threats to wildlife in fire-dependent ecosystems?

Leveraging LANDFIRE to understand ecological conditions across National Forests and Grasslands
2023-01-25 10:00 - 11:00
Webinar recording.
US Forest Service Ecologist, Sarah M. Anderson explains the Terrestrial Condition Assessment and how LANDFIRE products have informed the TCA. Sarah fields questions ranging from using the TCA to monitor ecological conditions, wildfire severity/fire deficits, KPIs in the USFS, and what it might take to move the needle on forest restoration.

An assessment of native seed needs and their capacity for their supply
2023-01-26 10:00 - 11:00
Webinar recording.

An Assessment of Native Seed Needs and the Capacity for Their Supply: Final Report will be released on Thursday, January 26, 2023. The report was authored by a committee appointed by the National Academies of Science, Medicine, and Engineering and will be available at 8 am Pacific/9 am Mtn on the National Academies Press website (www.nap.edu).
At 10 am Pacific/11 am Mtn that day there will be a public webinar on the report’s findings and recommendations. Members of the National Academies’ committee that authored the report will answer questions at the end of the presentation. The webinar is free, but registration is required.

Society for Range Management 2023 Meeting
2023-02-12 - 2023-02-16
Visit conference website.
This year’s annual conference will be in Boise, ID.

Fire history and ecology
2023-02-27 11:00 - 12:00
Webinar recordings of the Forest Service’s Research and Development SCIENCEx FIRE week.
Fire History and Ecology
Introduction to SCIENCEx Fire Week​ | Jens Stevens
​Indigenous Fire Stewardship and Cultural Burning​ | Frank Lake
​Fire Exclusion and Western Forest Change​ | Eric Knapp
A History of Fire in the Eastern US: ​How Humans Modified Fire Regimes through the Holocene​ | Dan Dey

Fire weather and smoke
2023-02-28 11:00 - 12:00
Webinar recording.
The second webinar of the Forest Service’s Research and Development SCIENCEx FIRE week.
Fire Weather and Smoke
Fire Weather Forecasting |​ Brian Potter
New Technology for Monitoring Smoke Impacts | Shawn Urbanski
Smoke Plume Dynamics |​ Yong Liu

Imagining and designing coherent, adaptation-oriented laws about wildfire
2023-03-01 09:30 - 10:00
Webinar recording.
Since 2010, Australian national and state governments have commissioned at least 101 post-emergency inquiries and reviews, each of which makes recommendations to improve the way we prevent, prepare for, respond to and recover from wildfires. Many of these reviews recommend specific changes to laws and policies, for example, to simplify permitting processes for clearing native vegetation and mitigating fire hazards. Of course, catastrophic wildfires are a growing challenge around the world, not just in Australia. Fires are breaking records for size, severity and cost every other year, and ‘unprecedented’ events are becoming distressingly common. As a result, recognition that changing fire regimes will require changes to the rulebooks, is also not limited to Australia. In California, governments have passed laws that have begun to address issues with liability and insurance arrangements for prescribed fire and to promote the reintroduction of cultural fire management. In this presentation, we take a step back and ask: What might it look like to design a great legal framework for the kinds of fire regimes that we are going to see in future? And how might we improve the role of law in facilitating rapid adaptation to increasingly frequent and destructive wildfires, to preserve the hope that we might one day live well with fire?

Fire behavior
2023-03-01 11:00 - 12:00
Webinar recording.
The third webinar of the Forest Service’s Research and Development SCIENCEx FIRE week.
Fire Behavior
Wildland Fire Behavior and Ignition | Sara McAllister
3D Time-Dependent Fire Behavior Models:​ What They Do and the Need for Observational Datasets | Ruddy Mell
Fire Behavior Assessment Team (FBAT) and Wildfire Monitoring |​ Matt Dickinson

Seed Innovations for Great Basin Landscapes - Webinar Recordings
2023-03-02 - 2023-03-09
3/2 – Seed Zones and Adaptive Traits (11 PST/12 MST) – Recording
Setting the landscape for native seed technologies: Balancing the need for wild, adapted native seeds with modifications needed for agricultural production and large-scale seeding – Beth Leger, University of Nevada, Reno
Guiding restoration with seed transfer zones: Concepts and applications – Rob Massatti, USGS
3/3 – Seed Modifications (11 PST/12 MST) – Recording
Application of seed coating technologies for rangeland restoration – Matt Madsen, Brigham Young University
Seed balls and other seed restoration innovations – Elise Gornish, University of Arizona
3/7 – Seed Delivery (*1 PST/2 MST, note the different time) – Recording
Drone seeding technology: A case study – Annabelle Monti, USFS; Maria Mircheva, Sugar Pine Foundation; Lauren Fletcher, Beta-Earth
Robots for microclimate identification and planting – Nichole Barger, TNC
3/9 – Current Perspectives on Seed Technology (11 PST/12 MST) – Recording
Management perspectives: Survey results – Mark Brunson, Utah State University
Managers’ solutions to local seeding challenges: Panel Q&A and discussion – Owen Baughman, TNC; Kevin Gunnell, UDNR; Erik Kriwox, Tony Owens, and Michael McCampbell, BLM

Modeling risks and tradeoffs
2023-03-02 11:00 - 12:00
Webinar recording.
The fourth webinar of the Forest Service’s Research and Development SCIENCEx FIRE week.
Modeling Risks and Tradeoffs
Wildland Fire Behavior and Ignition |​ Greg Dillon
Juggling Risks and Tradeoffs Toward a More Resilient Future: The Known, Unknown, Unknowable, and Unpleasant |​ Pat Manley & Nick Povak
Southern Forest Outlook: Fire in a Changing Landscape |​ Nick Gould

Looking toward the future
2023-03-03 11:00 - 12:00
Webinar recording.
The fifth webinar of the Forest Service’s Research and Development SCIENCEx FIRE week.
Looking Towards the Future
Historical and Future Fire in Temperate Rainforest ​of the Pacific Northwest |​ Matt Reilly
Assessing Wildfire Risk for Strategic Forest Management Decision-Making in the Southern US |​ Sandhya Nepal
Wrap-Up |​ Jens Stevens

Community-focused programs, datasets, and planning resources for wildfire risk mitigation
2023-03-09 10:00 - 11:00
Webinar recording.
Much of the current dialogue around mitigating wildfire risk to people and property in the United States focuses on vegetation treatments to reduce fuel loads on public lands. There is good reason for that – responsible management of lands within their jurisdiction is embedded within the mission of the Forest Service and other land management agencies. However, we can conceptualize wildfire risk to the built environment as having three primary components: likelihood of wildfire occurrence, intensity if a fire occurs, and susceptibility of an asset (e.g., a structure) to being damaged by a fire. Under this framing, treating fuels on public lands, sometimes far away from assets at risk, has a limited ability to reduce the likelihood and intensity of fire at the location of those assets, and has no effect on the susceptibility of the assets to damage. Conversely mitigation actions that have the greatest leverage on wildfire risk to built assets include reduction of fuels immediately adjacent to the asset and physical measures that can reduce the ignitability of a building. Examples of this include implementing Home Ignition Zone principles and using fire-resistant building materials. In this seminar, we will share examples of work happening within, or funded by, the Forest Service to foster these types of locally-focused mitigation actions and underscore the importance of these actions in the broader scope of the Wildfire Crisis Strategy.

How an evidence-based approach to community-focused wildfire education programs can put people at the center of wildfire solutions
2023-03-16 10:00 - 11:00
Webinar recording.
This seminar builds of the March 9, 2023 “Community-focused programs, datasets, and planning resources for wildfire risk mitigation” seminar (presenters: Greg Dillon, Eva Karau, Kelly Pohl) by focusing on how to support creation of fire-resilient communities. In particular, the presentation will highlight how the paired parcel risk and social data approach developed by the Wildfire Research (WiRē) Team supports action on private land parcels, across parcels within a community, and across boundaries to nearby public land. The WiRē Team is an established interagency research-practice team that provides wildfire mitigation and research expertise, data collection tools, and products for community wildfire education and mitigation programs.

Configuring ArcGIS field maps for invasive species management
2023-03-21 09:00 - 10:00
Webinar registration.

Assessing wildfire risk and mitigation opportunities in the sagebrush biome
2023-03-22 09:00 - 10:00

Native Seed Conference 2023
2023-03-27 - 2023-03-31
Access some of the recorded presentations.
The National Native Seed Conference connects Research, Industry, Land Management, and Restoration professionals, providing the premier opportunity to develop relationships and share information about the collection, research and development, production, and use of native plant materials.
The 2023 National Native Seed Conference is dedicated to the science, practice, and policy of producing and effectively using native seed. The conference supports the America the Beautiful Executive Order, National Seed Strategy for Rehabilitation and Restoration, and the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration.
Conference sessions will cover several topics, including:

Wild seed collection
Seed production
Industry opportunities and best practices
Traditional Ecological Knowledge
Evaluation and Research
Seed Partnerships
Wildlife and Pollinators

2023 Wildland Urban Interface Conference
2023-03-28 - 2023-03-30
Conference website.

Fire in the western US: Big fires. Big challenges. The call for regional learning and action.
2023-03-29 13:00 - 14:00
Webinar recording.
Learn about the diverse inputs and outcomes from six large fires spanning five JFSP Regional Fire Science Exchanges. This webinar walks you through the jointly produced story map: Fire in the Western U.S.: Big fires. Big challenges. Big need for regional learning and action.

Effectiveness of fuel treatments at the landscape scale
2023-04-05 10:00 - 11:30
Webinar recording.
A recent report, Effectiveness of fuel treatments at the landscape scale: State of understanding and key research gaps, provides key findings from four literature synthesis documents (concepts and fuel treatment effectiveness measurements, empirical, simulation, and case studies) that evaluate the extent to which landscape fuel treatments mitigate adverse effects of wildfire, provide opportunities to manage fire for beneficial effects of wildfire, provide opportunities for cost efficient fire suppression strategies, maximize fire responder safety, provide results to inform future fuel treatment planning, and identify research gaps.
Join the Joint Fire Science Network and Rocky Mountain Research Station for the Landscape Fuel Treatment Effectiveness webinar on Wednesday, April 5 from 11:00 – 12:30 MT.
Four Rocky Mountain Research Station scientists will present their latest research followed by a panel discussion and Q&A.

Lessons learned from wildland fire case studies | Ali Urza, Research Ecologist
Quantifying forest wildfire hazard and fuel treatment effectiveness from stands to landscapes | Sharon Hood, Research Ecologist
Fuel treatment scenarios tested through simulation studies | Jeff Ott, Research Ecologist
Is there empirical evidence for landscape-level fuel treatment effectiveness? | Shawn McKinney, Writer/Editor

Maximizing volunteer impact with ArcGIS hub
2023-04-18 09:00 - 10:00

Stream and Riparian Geomorphic Sensitivity and Ecological Resilience to Guide Management - Watershed processes, part 1
2023-04-25 09:00 - 10:00
Webinar recording.
This webinar provides a framework for assessing and characterizing the geomorphic sensitivity and ecological resilience of upland watersheds based on their predominant processes and the controls on these processes. The presenters illustrate how understanding the sensitivity, resilience, and process interactions can be used to assess the nature, magnitude, and potential responses of watersheds and stream reaches to disturbances and to determine their potential for restoration.
