Research and Publications
View brief.
Collaborations and partnerships are increasingly recognized as essential for effective natural resource conservation. In fact, the collaborative partnerships that developed from 2010 to 2015 have been recognized as a key reason why the greater sage-grouse was kept off the federal endangered species list. Whether partnerships between federal and state agencies with private landowners, restoration projects coordinated between non-profit groups and land management agencies, or the thousands of hours negotiating state sage-grouse conservation plans, the collaborative efforts across the West were – and still are – unprecedented.
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This report is intended to provide an initial assessment of both the potential effectiveness of fuel breaks and their ecological costs and benefits. To provide this assessment, the report examined prior studies on fuel breaks and other scientific evidence to address three crucial questions:
- How effective are fuel breaks in reducing or slowing the spread of wildfire in arid and semi-arid shrubland ecosystems?
- How do fuel breaks affect sagebrush plant communities?
- What are the effects of fuel breaks on the greater sage-grouse, other sagebrush obligates, and sagebrush-associated wildlife species?
It also provides an overview of recent federal policies and management directives aimed at protecting remaining sagebrush and greater sage-grouse habitat; describe the fuel conditions, fire behavior, and fire trends in the Great Basin; and suggest how scientific inquiry and management actions can improve our understanding of fuel breaks and their effects in sagebrush landscapes.
The greater sage-grouse (hereafter GRSG) has been a focus of scientific investigation and management action for the past two decades. The 2015 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service listing determination of “not warranted” was in part due to a large-scale collaborative effort to develop strategies to conserve GRSG populations and their habitat and to reduce threats to both. New scientific information augments existing knowledge and can help inform updates or modifications to existing plans for managing GRSG and sagebrush ecosystems. However, the sheer number of scientific publications can be a challenge for managers tasked with evaluating and determining the need for potential updates to existing planning documents. To assist in this process, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has reviewed and summarized the scientific literature published since January 1, 2015.
To identify articles and reports published about GRSG, we first conducted a structured search of three reference databases (Web of Science, Scopus, and Google Scholar) using the search term “greater sage-grouse.” We refined the initial list of products by (1) removing duplicates, (2) excluding products that were not published as research or scientific review articles in peer-reviewed journals or as formal government technical reports, and (3) retaining only those products for which GRSG or their habitat was a research focus.
In October 2017, after a review of the 2015 Federal plans relative to State sage-grouse plans, in accordance with Secretarial Order 3353, the BLM issued a notice of intent to consider whether to amend some, all, or none of the 2015 land use plans. At that time, the BLM requested the USGS to inform this effort through the development of an annotated bibliography of sage-grouse science published since January 2015 and a report that synthesized and outlined the potential management implications of this new science. Development of the annotated bibliography resulted in the identification and summarization of 169 peer-reviewed scientific publications and reports. The USGS then convened an interagency team (hereafter referred to as the “team”) to develop this report that focuses on the primary topics of importance to the ongoing management of sage-grouse and their habitats.
The team developed this report in a three-step process. First, the team identified six primary topic areas for discussion based on the members’ collective knowledge regarding sage-grouse, their habitats, and threats to either or both. Second, the team reviewed all the material in the Annotated Bibliography of Scientific Research on Greater Sage-Grouse Published since January 2015 to identify the science that addressed the topics. Third, team members discussed the science related to each topic, evaluated the consistency of the science with existing knowledge before 2015, and summarized the potential management implications of this science. The six primary topics identified by the team were:
- Multiscale habitat suitability and mapping tools
- Discrete anthropogenic activities
- Diffuse activities
- Fire and invasive species
- Restoration effectiveness
- Population estimation and genetics
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This study evaluated how targeted grazing treatments interacted with seed rate, spatial planting arrangement (mixtures vs. monoculture strips), seed coating technology, and species identity (five native grasses) to affect standing biomass and seeded plant density in experimental greenstrips.
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It’s not the way we fight wildfires in the West that’s the problem. The problem is the way we manage our fire-dependent forests.
Since 2000, 154 wildfires in the region have cost over $20 million each to control. Many of them cost several times more. Together, these costliest fires, which were less than one-tenth of 1 percent of all Western wildfires in the period, cost more than $9 billion to fight. If you factor in property losses, natural resource damage and environmental impacts, the true costs skyrocket, but they are rarely measured or accounted for. What can’t be ignored is that these unprecedented wildfires tell us we need a much better land-management strategy.
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Projections of worsening wildfire conditions under climate change are a major concern in policy and management, but there is little understanding of geographical variation in fire-climate relationships. This analysis relating climate variables to historical fire activity across the United States showed substantial variability in the importance of different seasonal temperature and precipitation variables and of climate overall in explaining fire activity. Climate was significantly less important where humans were more prevalent, suggesting that human influence could override or even exceed the effect of climate change on fire activity. Although climate change may play a significant role in altering future fire regimes, geographical context and human influence should also be accounted for in management and policy decisions.
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Debate as to whether restoration is feasible is coupled to long-standing disputes regarding the definition of restoration, whether more-damaged lands are worthy of restoration efforts given limited financial resources, and ongoing conflicts as to whether the novel ecosystem concept is a help or a hindrance to restoration efforts. A willingness to consider restoration options that have promise, yet would have previously been regarded as ‘taboo’ based on the precautionary principle, is increasing. Functional restoration is becoming more prominent in the scientific literature, as evidenced by an increased emphasis on functional traits, as opposed to a simple inventory of vascular plant species. Biodiversity continues to be important, but an increasingly expansive array of provenance options that are less stringent than the traditional ‘local is best’ is now being considered. Increased appreciation for soil health, plant–soil feedbacks, biological crusts, and water quality is evident. In the United States, restoration projects are becoming increasingly motivated by or tied to remediation of major environmental problems or recovery of fauna that are either charismatic, for example, the monarch butterfly, or deliver key ecosystem services, for example, hymenopteran pollinators.
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This study informs researchers and practitioners seeking to optimize terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) sampling methods for vegetation monitoring in dryland ecosystems through three analyses. First, we quantify the 2D extent of occluded regions based on the range from single scan positions. Second, we measure the efficacy of additional scan positions on the reduction of 2D occluded regions (area) using progressive configurations of scan positions in 1 ha plots. Third, we test the reproducibility of 3D sampling yielded by a 5-scan/ha sampling methodology using redundant sets of scans. Analyses were performed using measurements at analysis scales of 5 to 50 cm across the 1-ha plots, and we considered plots in grass and shrub-dominated communities separately.
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This project inventoried 97 projects implemented by 32 organizations, most in the last 10 years. We found that beaver-related stream restoration projects undertaken mostly involved the relocation of nuisance beavers. The most common goal was to store water, either with beaver dams or artificial structures. Beavers were often moved without regard to genetics, disease, or potential conflicts with nearby landowners. Few projects included post-implementation monitoring or planned for longer term issues, such as what happens when beavers abandon a site or when beaver dams or structures breach. Human dimensions were rarely considered and water rights and other issues were mostly unresolved or addressed through ad-hoc agreements. We conclude that the practice and implementation of beaver-related restoration has outpaced research on its efficacy and best practices. Further scientific research is necessary, especially research that informs the establishment of clear guidelines for best practices.