Assessing the impacts of post-fire drill seeding on archaeological resources: A case study from the Owyhee Uplands in southwest Idaho
2017-02-15
Webinar brief.
Rangeland drills are commonly employed for post fire rehabilitation and emergency stabilization. With the assumption that adverse effects will occur, archaeological sites are flagged and avoided. This may cause a site stranding effect and greater potential for post fire erosion. To better understand and quantify the effects we evaluated four archaeological sites characterized as lithic scatters. Artifacts were documented and point-plotted using sub-centimeter GPS technology, subjected to drill seeding, and subsequently replotted and reevaluated. This presentation will detail the methods and results of this study and thoughts for future application. This webinar was presented by Kirk Halford, BLM, Boise.
Webinar recording

Weed-free seed, unicorns, and other myths
2017-03-15
Webinar brief.
This webinar presents an overview of how to understand what weeds are and are not included in weed testing for seed that is sold in industry or increased under contract, and presents tools to help determine what weeds are actually present in seed procured by the end-user. A seed ordering guidance paper will also be made available. Presented by Steve Popovich, Emergency Stabilization and Rehabilitation National Program Lead, BLM, Washington D.C.
Webinar recording.

Weed-free mulch, unicorns, and other myths
2017-04-05 11:30 - 12:30 (America/Los_Angeles)
Webinar brief.
This webinar presents an overview to understanding what weeds are and are not included in agricultural straw/mulch certified under Weed-Free Forage programs by states and the North American Invasive Species Management Association (NAISMA). It presents simple steps the user can take to make informed decisions when acquiring mulch to assess and minimize weed presence, including office and field tips. Alternative sources to agricultural mulch and relative costs are also discussed. Presented by Steve Popovich, Forest Botanist and Rare and Invasive Species Program Manager, USFS, Ft. Collins, CO.
Webinar recording

Unmanned Aerial Systems Noxious Weeds and Fuel Load Program
2017-04-20
View webinar recording.
This webinar presents the Unmanned Aerial Systems (Drones) Resource Management Technologies – Fuel Load and Noxious Weeds Program, which can map, identify, treat, quantify and measure fuel loads and noxious weeds utilizing hyperspectral and LiDAR sensors combined with drone technologies. Chris Wilson of Wilson Herbicide, partnered with Maser Consulting, presents.
Disclaimer: Hosting this webinar does not constitute an endorsement by the Great Basin Fire Science Exchange of Wilson Herbicide or Maser Consulting and the Great Basin Fire Science Exchange has not investigated claims made by any advertiser.

Do you suffer from biocrust blindness? What you need to know about biological soil crusts in the Great Basin
2017-05-31 11:30 - 12:30
Biological soil crusts refer to a community of organisms that live on the soil surface in arid and semi-arid lands, including fungi, lichens, mosses and cyanobacteria. These organisms contribute to nutrient and hydrologic cycling as well as the prevention of soil erosion. This webinar discusses the distribution of biocrusts in the region as well as their recovery from disturbance and restoration. Presented by Lea Condon, Research Ecologist at the USGS Forest and Rangeland Ecosystem Science Center, Corvallis, OR.
Webinar recording

Rangeland Fire Protection Associations in Oregon and Idaho: Implications for fire adaptation and agency-community relationships
2017-06-07 10:00 - 11:00
Webinar recording.
This webinar discusses Rangeland Fire Protection Associations, which are unique partnerships wherein ranchers and the Bureau of Land Management work together to suppress rangeland wildfires. Using four case studies in Oregon and Idaho, the value and outcomes of this approach, as well as challenges and future implications for fire adaptation on the range are discussed. Presented by Emily Jane Davis, Oregon State University.

Restoring and conserving Great Basin ecosystems field tour
2017-06-11 - 2017-06-12
This two day field tour discussed conservation and restoration issues in watersheds, riparian ecosystems, and meadows on day one, and piñon-juniper expansion, cheatgrass invasion, and fire on day two. Presenters were from federal and state agencies and the University of Nevada, Reno.
View the flyer and the agenda.

Ecology (UI Course NR 321)
2017-06-12
Course Description: Fundamental principles of the science of ecology. Major topics covered by the course include the physical environment, how organisms interact with each other and their environment, evolutionary processes, population dynamics, communities, energy flow and ecosystems, human influences on ecosystems, and the integration and scaling of ecological processes through systems ecology. Computer-based materials are used extensively for guided independent learning of ecology.
Prerequisites: Introductory biology, or permission.
Recommended preparation: Introductory botany and zoology, and a good working knowledge of Windows-based computer systems.
Computer compatibility: The course learning materials are compatible only with computers that are 100% compatible with the Windows operating system and the browser, Internet Explorer.
>> More information

Regional mapping of herbaceous annual cover in the Great Basin
2017-07-26
View webinar recording.
Bruce Wylie and Stephen Boyte, USGS, discuss their recent research mapping herbaceous annual cover in the Great Basin. This webinar was hosted by the Great Basin LCC.

Mid-succession fire effects and reburn potential in model sagebrush ecosystems
2017-07-28 10:00 - 11:00
View webinar recording.
This webinar describes:

The long-term (17-26 year) post-fire accumulation in fuel loads and resultant potential fire behavior where historical prefire and immediate postfire data exists in Wyoming and Basin big sagebrush communities.
Fuel loads accumulation and structure along a time-since-fire. chronosequence in Wyoming, mountain, and low sagebrush ecosystems
The fuels and reburn potential in once and twice burned Basin big sagebrush plant communities.
Plant community change 17 years post fire in Wyoming big sagebrush ecosystems.

Presented by: Lisa Ellsworth, Oregon State University.

Interpreting climate change - Self-study modules
2017-08-01
Access learning modules.
On this National Park Service learning site you will find a variety of ways to hone your knowledge and skills for interpreting climate change. The modules are designed for self-study, in your own time and at your own pace. There are four modules: 1) Introduction to Interpreting Climate Change, 2) Knowledge of the Resource Issue, 3) Knowledge of the Audience, and 4) Appropriate Techniques and Strategies.

Online Grazing Management Courses
2017-08-02
Access short course.
This open-access short course provides fundamental information on rangeland ecology and management. It is hosted by the University of California Rangelands Research & Education Archive and is of interest to staff in government agencies and NGOs who manage local, state, and federal lands—including open space districts, county parks, water districts—and those who conduct education programs on these lands.
The four module course was developed by Dr. Mel George and Cody Sheehy in collaboration with UC Cooperative Extension Livestock and Natural Resource Advisors and University of California and California State University faculty. Course materials were developed with support from USDA Western SARE and RREA.

Ecophysiology (UI Course, REM 560)
2017-08-21
Course Description: Functional responses and adaptations of individual species to their environment, emphasizing the physiological mechanisms that influence the interactions between organisms and the major environmental factors (e.g., solar radiation, energy balance, temperature, water and nutrients, climate), and how this affects the interactions among species and their growth and survival (e.g., competition, herbivory, and allelopathy). Interactive computer-based learning materials are used extensively.
Prerequisites: A course in general ecology (e.g., Ecology NR 321), general botany or plant physiology, or permission.
Recommended preparation: Review of plant physiology
Computer compatibility: The course learning materials are compatible only with computers that are 100% compatible with the Windows operating system and the browser, Internet Explorer.
>> More information

Using weed-suppressive bacteria to control invasive annuals
2017-08-28
View webinar recording.
Cheatgrass and medusahead invasions pose a serious threat to Great Basin ecosystems. Managers and scientists are hopeful that strains of the bacterium Pseudomonas fluorescens will be able to selectively inhibit root growth of annual weeds in more complex rangeland ecosystems. These weed-suppressive bacteria (WSB) are now commercially available in many states and have been applied on tens of thousands of acres across the Great Basin, yet results are variable and largely unpublished, indicating that much remains to be understood about when, where and why WSB are or are not effective. This webinar features six speakers: Matt Germino, USGS and Great Basin LCC; David Pyke, USGS; Richard Lee, BLM; Mike Gregg, USFWS; Jane Mangold, Montana State University, and Brynne Lazarus, USGS.

Explained in 90 seconds: How climate change fuels wildfires
2017-08-30
90 second video.
In this video, Matthew Hurteau — assistant professor of forest resources at Penn State University — explains how warming temperatures, prolonged drought, and a century’s worth of fire suppression policy are “priming the system to make it more flammable.”

Implementing the National Seed Strategy: National, regional, and local perspectives
2017-09-13
View webinar recording.
Three speakers from three different federal agencies discuss implementation opportunities and challenges from a national, regional and local perspective. Examples will relate to strategy goals (producing and providing needed seed, conducting research, expanding tools for land managers and communications).

Effects of grazing on sage-grouse and other shrub-steppe birds: A collaborative project to inform management of sage-steppe rangelands
2017-09-13
View webinar recording.
Greater sage-grouse have declined since the mid-1960s, and grazing is the most extensive land use within sage-grouse habitat. The webinar presents progress on a 10-year project designed to document the effects of cattle grazing on: 1) demographic traits of greater sage-grouse; 2) sage-grouse habitat characteristics, 3) insect abundance (important prey for sage-grouse chicks), and 4) abundance of all other bird species. The research team is working at five study sites in Idaho where they randomly assign BLM pastures to one of four grazing treatments that include spring-only grazing, spring and fall grazing, and no grazing. The research team includes Courtney Conway (Idaho Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit), Karen Launchbaugh (University of Idaho), David Musil (Idaho Department of Fish and Game), Andrew Meyers (University of Idaho), Paul Makela (Bureau of Land Management), and Shane Roberts (Idaho Department of Fish and Game).

Biophysical settings review in the Great Basin: What it is? How it works? Why it matters?
2017-09-27 11:30 - 12:30
Webinar brief
Webinar recording
This webinar, led by LANDFIRE Fire Ecologist Kori Blankenship, provides an introduction to LANDFIRE BpS models and invites your participation in the current BpS review opportunities. Intermountain Basin Big Sagebrush Shrubland and Intermountain Basin Big Sagebrush Steppe ecosystems cover over 90 million acres in the western U.S. and provide critical habitat for the greater sage-grouse. Improving the models for these ecosystems helps LANDFIRE more accurately map fire regimes and vegetation departure, and enables us to provide a more current and robust product for use in land management planning activities.

Recovery and adaptation after wildfire
2017-10-04 11:55 - 13:30
View webinar recording.
Becoming a fire-adapted community that can live with wildfire is envisioned as a continuous, iterative process of adaptation. Miranda Mockrin, a research scientist with the Forest Service combined national and case study research to examine how experience with wildfire alters the built environment and community- and government-level wildfire mitigation, planning, and regulations. Research suggests that adaptation to wildfire through WUI regulations depends on multiple factors, including past experience with fire and the geographic extent and scale of the fire event relative to the local community and its government. While communities did not often pursue changes in WUI regulations, experience with wildfire was frequently cited as the impetus for other adaptive responses, such as improving emergency response or fire suppression, and expanding education and interaction with homeowners, such as Firewise programs or government support for fuel mitigation on private lands.

Modeling dynamic fuels with an index system: MoD-FIS in the Great Basin and southwestern US
2017-10-10 11:30 - 12:30
Webinar recording
The LANDFIRE Program strives to produce consistent fire behavior fuel model grids for the U.S. These models are relevant for predicting fire behavior, including spread and intensity, during average conditions; however, they often fall short during drought or seasonably dry conditions.
To address the need for that information, LANDFIRE developed a seasonal product named the Modeling Dynamic-Fuels with an Index System (MoD-FIS). These provisional products have been released for the Southwest and Great Basin regions, and are ready for testing and review by those who use LANDFIRE data. In this webinar, Charley Martin and Tobin Smail offer a MoD-FIS primer, explain how the products can be used in these regions, and solicit users’ input and review.
This webinar was co-hosted by LANDFIRE and members of the Joint Fire Science Program: Great Basin Fire Science, Southwest Fire Science, and Northern Rockies Fire Science. Content addresses challenges that managers of large landscapes deal with in these regions.

Relations among cheatgrass-driven fire, climate and sensitive-status birds across the Great Basin
2017-10-11 10:00 - 11:00
View webinar recording.
This webinar highlights a project examining how projected changes in fire regimes and fire and fuels treatments may affect habitat quality for and probability of occupancy of sensitive-status breeding birds. Statistical change-point analyses will be used to detect any abrupt, nonlinear temporal changes-thresholds-in projected vegetation cover, habitat quality, and occupancy. Detection of ecological thresholds, if they exist, may suggest fuels treatments and restoration actions that will decrease the probability of entering into or remaining within undesirable ecological states. Webinar speakers are: Erica Fleishman, University of California Davis, and Jimi Gragg, Utah Division of Wildlife Resources.

Era of Megafires Presentation with Paul Hessburg
2017-10-11 19:00
View the Ted Talk.
The Era of Megaﬁres is a 70-minute, multi-media presentation hosted by Dr. Paul Hessburg, who has conducted ﬁre and landscape ecology research for more than 27 years. The presented material comes in the form of fast-moving, short, topic-based talks interspersed with compelling video vignettes and features the work of wildﬁre photographer, John Marshall. Think Ted X mixed with snappy documentary shorts and compelling photography. The videos are produced by award-winning documentary ﬁlm company, North 40 Productions, of Wenatchee, WA.
The presentation is designed to educate audiences across the West so that they may better participate in the conversation and solutions surrounding the Megaﬁre issue.
Sponsors for this event include U.S. Forest Service Intermountain Region, Salmon-Challis National Forest and the Northern Rockies Fire Science Network.
The presentation will take place at the Sacajawea Center in Salmon, Idaho. Doors will open at 6:30PM, and the presentation will begin at 7:00PM.

Using climate and water models to examine future water availability and biodiversity in CA and the Great Basin
2017-10-19 14:30 - 15:30
View webinar recording.
As the predicted impacts of climate change are becoming more apparent, natural resource managers are faced with the task of developing climate adaptation plans. These managers need state-of-the-art, scientifically based information upon which to base these management plans and decisions consistently across California and the Great Basin. In this webinar, principal investigator Lorraine Flint, USGS, provides an overview of the project and emerging results. The project applies historical, current, and projected climate data to a regional water model to examine water availability, biodiversity, and conservation. Analysis of this climate and hydrology data will help managers understand areas in the region and landscape where the effects of climate change are expected to be the most profound. The study also addresses how the environment is likely to change and how certain the scientific community is about these changes. Collaboration among managers, scientists, conservation organizations, and others will guide the utility, understandability, relevance, and accessibility of the findings from this project.

Fire Prediction Across Scales - 2017 Conference
2017-10-23 - 2017-10-25 | Columbia University’s Morningside Campus, New York, United States
The Columbia University Initiative on Extreme Weather and Climate is pleased to announce the conference “Fire Prediction Across Scales”, in New York City. The goal of the conference is to synthesize the cutting edge in fire prediction, ranging from the behavior of a single wildfire, to changes in global fire patterns over centuries.
The conference is intended for all in academia, government, and the private sector with an interest in the latest science behind fire prediction. Through a small set of invited talks, contributed posters, and discussion sessions, the conference will showcase the latest research on fire prediction and provide opportunities for networking and unstructured discussion.
For more information, visit conference website.

Interagency coordination to meet multiple objectives: An effective approach to wildfire
2017-11-01
View webinar recording.
While the number of acres burned annually by uncharacteristic wildfire continues to grow, it is becoming exceedingly important for agencies to identify opportunities to use wildfire to meet multiple land management and resource objectives. When conditions allow for unplanned ignitions to be managed for one or more of these objectives, it may be appropriate to use wildfire during the peak of the traditional fire season. Management response to wildland fire on federal lands is based on objectives established in the applicable Land/Resource Management Plan and/or Fire Management Plan. Objectives are affected by changes in fuels, weather, topography; varying social understanding and tolerance; and involvement of other governmental jurisdictions having different missions and objectives. Coordination with resource specialists and development of mutually agreed to objectives is fundamental to being successful in achieving land and resource objectives with wildfire. This webinar discusses recommendations for implementing this process using case studies incorporating Mexican spotted owl management objectives into wildfire management and post-fire monitoring. Presented by Shaula Hedwall, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service and Wesley Hall, Coconino National Forest.

Successful vegetation management practices in the sagebrush-steppe
2017-11-01 - 2017-11-10
Learn more from the overview webinar.
Access training modules.
This learning series responds to Section 7.b.iii, Action Item #5 within the Fuels section of the 2015 Integrated Rangeland Fire Management Strategy, which calls for a comprehensive knowledge transfer program to enhance the fuels management program’s role in sagebrush-steppe management. The Strategy is intended to improve the efficiency and efficacy of actions to address rangeland fire, to better prevent and suppress rangeland fire, and improve efforts to restore fire-impacted landscapes.
The learning modules synthesize the state of the science for six management topics:

Background and origins of the conservation problems facing the sagebrush steppe and greater sage-grouse
Understanding and applying the concepts of resistance and resilience
Management of sagebrush ecosystems experiencing conifer encroachment
Management of sagebrush ecosystems at risk of or invaded by invasive annual grasses
Restoration of sagebrush steppe ecosystems
Issues specific to the eastern range of greater sage-grouse

Assessment of the effects of non-native ungulate grazing on greater sage-grouse
2017-11-01 15:00 - 16:00
Webinar recording.
This webinar describes a project that uses management-related variation in grazing by both feral horses and livestock as well as five years of field work to assess how both greater sage-grouse and the habitats on which they depend might be influenced by grazing.
The research team includes James S. Sedinger, Tessa L. Behnke, Levi Jaster and Phillip A. Street from the University of Nevada Reno.

An all lands approach to grazing management
2017-11-02 10:00 - 11:30
View webinar recording.
The webinar “An All Lands Approach to Grazing Management” examined cross-boundary strategies for cooperative grazing management between a variety of federal and state agencies in Idaho. These efforts seek to achieve a more flexible management system across ownership boundaries to better respond to various rangeland challenges. Moderator: Curtis Elke, State Conservationist for Idaho, USDA-Natural Resource Conservation Service. Panelists: Karen Launchbaugh, Director, University of Idaho Rangeland Center; Dustin Miller, Administrator, Idaho Governor’s Office of Species Conservation; Chris Black, Chair, Board of Directors, Idaho Rangeland Resource Commission; June Shoemaker, Idaho State Director for Resources, Bureau of Land Management. This webinar is part of the series for the National Forest and Rangeland Management Initiative, the Chairman’s Initiative of WGA Chair and Montana Gov. Steve Bullock.

Decision support tools for natural resource managers in sagebrush communities and across the Pacific Northwest
2017-11-07 08:30 - 17:00 | Bend, OR, Bend, United States
View workshop resources.
The Conservation Biology Institute, the Great Basin LCC, Oregon State University, and EcoAdapt hosted a workshop to present a series of decision support tools for land managers in the PNW. You can access the tools discussed at the workshop, from this webpage.

Effect of fuels management, previous wildfire, and fire weather on Rim Fire severity
2017-11-13
View webinar recording.
Large wildfire incidence has increased in forests throughout the western U.S. following changes in vegetation structure and pattern, along with a changing climate. Given this increase there is great interest in whether fuels treatments and previous wildfire can alter fire severity patterns in large wildfires. The 255,000 acre 2013 Rim Fire created an opportunity to study fuels treatment effects across a large forested landscape in the Sierra Nevada. We assessed the relative influence of previous fuels treatments (including wildfire), fire weather, vegetation and water balance on Rim Fire severity. We did this at three different spatial scales to investigate whether the influences on fire severity changed across scales.
