Webinar
Webinar recording.
A presentation on Potential Operational Delineations (PODs) from multiple perspectives including both scientists and managers. We will discuss how PODs were used in Northern New Mexico past fire seasons where PODS were utilized; with an emphasis on PODs as a fire planning tool, new developments in research and applications, and innovations within the planning framework.
Webinar recording.
Description: Changing disturbance regimes and climate can overcome forest ecosystem resilience. Following high-severity fire, forest recovery may be compromised by lack of tree seed sources, warmer and drier postfire climate, or short-interval reburning. A potential outcome of the loss of resilience is the conversion of the prefire forest to a different forest type or nonforest vegetation. Conversion implies major, extensive, and enduring changes in dominant species, life forms, or functions, with impacts on ecosystem services. The webinar will synthesize a growing body of evidence of fire-driven conversion and our understanding of its causes across western North America. Increasing forest vulnerability to changing fire activity and climate compels shifts in management approaches, and we propose key themes for applied research coproduced by scientists and managers to support decision-making in an era when the prefire forest may not return.
Presenters: Jonathan Coop, Western Colorado University; Sean Parks, US Forest Service; Camille Stevens-Rumann, Colorado State University
Description: Throughout the past 5 years, Gila County has been faced with record breaking wildfire activity. Learn how Gila County Emergency Management works with their Public Safety partners to overcome the challenges that come with Wildfire season. Acquire skills about planning tools such as the Gila County Community Wildfire Protection Plans (CWPP) and how you can help to protect your home and community from the ever evolving threat of wildfire, and the post-fire flooding events that follow.
Presenter: Carl Melford, Gila County Emergency Manager. After graduating from Globe High School in 2008, Carl began his public safety career as a Detention Officer with the Gila County Sheriff’s Office. Within his first 6 months of employment, Carl was promoted to Classification Specialist, and had written his first evacuation plan, all at the age of 18. In 2011, Carl graduated from the Southern Arizona Law Enforcement Training Center and was hired as a Police Officer with the Globe Police Department. During that time, His focus was on building resilient communities, and emergency planning. In 2015, Carl was hired by Gila County Emergency Management, where he began serving many roles in the Emergency Operations Centers across the state, as well as implementing Gila Counties own Emergency Notification Program. In 2017, Carl was promoted to Emergency Manager. Since then, Carl has taken pride in improving the mitigation, preparedness, response, and recovery capabilities of Gila County.
In 2009, new guidance for wildland fire management in the United States expanded the range of strategic options for managers working to reduce the threat of high-severity wildland fire, improve forest health and respond to a changing climate. Markedly, the new guidance provided greater flexibility to manage wildland fires to meet multiple resource objectives. We use Incident Status Summary reports to understand how wildland fire management strategies have differed across the western US in recent years and how management has changed since the 2009 Guidance for Implementation of Federal Wildland Fire Management Policy. When controlling for confounding variation, we found the 2009 Policy Guidance along with other concurrent advances in fire management motivated an estimated 27 to 73% increase in the number of fires managed with expanded strategic options, with only limited evidence of an increase in size or annual area burned. Fire weather captured a manager’s intent and allocation of fire management resources relative to burning conditions, where a manager’s desire and ability to suppress is either complemented by fire weather, at odds with fire weather, or put aside due to other priorities. We highlight opportunities to expand the use of strategic options in fire-adapted forests to improve fuel heterogeneity.
Description: Plant invasions cause dramatic shifts in plant communities and ecosystem processes. While these changes are obvious aboveground, less is known about changes belowground. Focusing on the most significant invaders in our area in the Intermountain West of the United States, this seminar will highlight how spotted knapweed (Centaurea stoebe), leafy spurge (Euphorbia esula), cheatgrass (Bromus tectorum) and sulfur cinquefoil (Potentilla recta) alter soil microbial communities and nutrient cycles, and what the consequences of these shifts might be for restoration.
Speaker: Dr. Ylva Lekberg is a soil ecologist at MPG Ranch and an adjunct professor at University of Montana. Her research focuses on structural and functional shifts in soil ecosystems associated with plant invasions, and how these changes may affect restoration success. Prior to her work in invasion biology, Ylva explored the role of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi in subsistence farmers’ fields in Sub-Saharan Africa, coastal grasslands in Denmark and geothermal areas in Yellowstone.
Description: Landscapes of the Inland West are deeply affected by 100+ years of fire exclusion, the loss of indigenous burning, and expansion and densification of many forests. Today, anthropogenic climate change and wildfires are modifying the structure and composition of forests across the West at rates that far exceed adaptation and restorative treatments. Fires that occur during the forest planning process can delay project implementation for years, further hindering the pace of restoration activities. Landscape evaluations and prescriptions are needed so that managers can assess the work of wildfires on affected landscapes; the topic of this webinar.
Presenters and research team: Andrew Larson, C. Alina Cansler, Derek Churchill, Paul Hessburg Sr., Sean Jeronimo, Van Kane, Jim Lutz, and Nicholas Povak.
Wildfire Risk to Communities is a national tool with interactive maps, charts, and resources to help every community in the U.S. understand, explore, and reduce wildfire risk. In the fall of 2020, the website was updated with new data and features, including new map views and GIS data available for download. During this webinar, see a demonstration of the Wildfire Risk to Communities and learn about data updates. Wildfire Risk to Communities was created by the USDA Forest Service under the direction of Congress and builds on nationwide LANDFIRE data.
Webinar recording.
In this webinar, RMRS research physical scientist Shawn Urbanski and fire ecologist Duncan Lutes will discuss the current state of the science on wildland fire smoke emissions, including pollutants present in smoke, methods for quantifying emission flux, existing datasets, tools, and models, and deficiencies in current scientific understanding.
Webinar recording.
In this webinar, RMRS research ecologist Sean Healey will discuss improved techniques for mapping forest disturbance and recovery across the United States with remotely sensed data.
Presenters:
Cathelijne Stoof, Wageningen University, Netherlands
Val Chalton, Landworks, South Africa
Tomás Withington, Administración de Parques Nacionales de Argentina, Argentina
Cristiano Foderi, University of Firenze, Italy
Erin Belval, Colorado State University, USA