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Selecting species and seed from appropriate sources to maximize project success faces many challenges. This presentation will review plant selection for ecosystem diversity that supports economically and ecologically practical outcomes. Habitat degradation and loss have accelerated globally, resulting in loss of biological diversity and species endangerment at unprecedented scales. Restoring habitats that provide ecosystem services necessary for all life is crucial. One of the biggest hurdles to habitat restoration is the availability of seeds of native plants to provide a diverse and resilient base of the food chain. Plant diversity is now clearly a fundamental driver of ecosystem services and the diversity of other organisms, and native plant diversity is needed because invasive plants tend to reduce diversity and homogenize vegetation on the landscape. Seeding with native plants is one of the few reliable methods of restoring diversity at all levels, even in the face of climate change and controversial novel ecosystems. Therefore, selecting and sourcing the right plants for restoration sites is vital for the successful establishment of diverse and resilient native ecosystems. This presentation webinar will describe the results of recent published and unpublished research on local adaptation, successful creation of diverse regional seed admixtures, the importance of landscape context, and innovative species selection strategies and tools.
Description: Management of expanding pinyon-juniper woodlands in sagebrush habitats has become a prominent strategy for sagebrush conservation, with spatially targeted tree removal efforts designed to benefit sage-grouse increasing over the past decade. This webinar will highlight recent literature on wildlife response to pinyon-juniper management across the West, and new science and tools for considering sagebrush- and woodland-obligate songbirds, like pinyon jay, in conifer management. Knowledge gained from wildlife studies will be put into context of emerging remote sensing analyses that provide a comprehensive picture of continued woodland change.
Presenters: Jason Tack, US Fish and Wildlife Service, Habitat and Population Evaluation Team, Missoula, MT; Jeremy Maestas, USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, West National Technology Support Center, Portland, OR.
CE Credits: This webinar was approved by the Society for Ecological Restoration for 1 Continuing Education Credit (CEC).
To receive credit you’ll need to reference pre-approval code 16067645 and upload your webinar certificate (automatically emailed from Joint Fire Science Program JFSP following your attendance) at ser.submittable.com
Rick Miller, Professor Emeritus, OSU, discusses the intent and goals of his latest publication, The Ecology, History, Ecohydrology, and Management of Pinyon and Juniper Woodlands in the Great Basin and Northern Colorado Plateau in the Western United States. This includes 1) Describing the the woodlands and the vast variation across the GB and CP, 2) Telling the story of their history and variables influencing woodland expansion and contraction, and 3) Interpretation of the wide variation in responses and the variables influencing ecosystem response to restoration.
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The Fuel Breaks in Sagebrush: A Multidisciplinary Webinar Series and Discussion is made up of six webinars featuring topics important to fuel breaks in the Great Basin.
3/25 – What Are Fuel Breaks, Why Are We Doing Them? (11 PDT/12 MDT)- Recording and Q & A
Purpose of fuel breaks – Jeff Rose, BLM
BLM agency/policy perspective – Jolie Pollet, BLM
USFS agency/policy perspective and how it relates to Shared Stewardship – Duncan Leao, USFS
3/31 – Ecological Considerations of Fuel Breaks (11 PDT/12 MDT)- Recording
Overview of fuel break ecological considerations – Eva Strand, University of Idaho
Control of cheatgrass and other weeds in fuel breaks – Tim Prather, University of Idaho
How to use the “Science Framework” for fuel break planning – Michele Crist, BLM
4/8 – Science Gaps, Modeling, and Efficacy (11 PDT/12 MDT)- Recording
Science and data gaps: How we’re addressing them – Doug Shinneman, USGS
Current use of fire and fuels models – Russ Parsons, USFS
SageSTEP: What are the most effective treatments for constructing fuel breaks? Lisa Ellsworth and Claire Williams, Oregon State University
4/14 – Targeted Grazing for Fuel Breaks (11 PDT/12 MDT)- Recording
Targeted grazing: A large multiregional fuel breaks project – Pat Clark, ARS
Sheep grazing success in the WUI – Lyndsey Boyer, Carson City Parks, Recreation, and Open Space
4/21 – Fuel Breaks in Practice (11 PDT/12 MDT)- Recording
A fuels treatment success story in the Pine Nut Mountains of Nevada – Keith Barker, BLM
Successes and challenges with a suite of fuel break projects – Lance Okeson, BLM
4/28 – Bringing it All Together- (11 PDT/12 MDT)- Recording
How do we move forward in an era of uncertainty: Facilitated panel Q & A – Jeremy Maestas, NRCS, Justin Boeck, BLM, and Michele Crist, BLM
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In this webinar, Matt Jolly (Research Ecologist, USDA Forest Service Rocky Mountain Research Station) presents the structure and function of the current version of the US National Fire Danger Rating, NFDRS2016. He shows how this system can be used to assess seasonal variations in fuel moisture and fire potential and how it can be used to quantify fire season severity anywhere in the country. Jolly demonstrates the use of FireFamily+ Version 5.0 to explore local fire weather conditions and suggests ways to use both tabular and graphical displays to communicate fire danger conditions to a variety of audiences such as firefighters, IMT members, fire management officers, line officers and the public. Finally, he introduces new spatial fire danger assessment tools and discuss the future of NFDRS.
This webinar will provide an introduction to the fundamental concepts and tools for understanding the who, what, why and how for managing prescribed fire smoke in the Southeast. Speakers from regional air quality regulation programs will discuss topics including: smoke production, smoke prediction, regional regulations, health impacts and more. Following the presentation there will be time for audience Q/A with the speakers.
A 1.5 hour webinar from the EPA Region 4, Georgia Department of Natural Resources Environmental Protection Division, North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality Air Quality Division, SERPPAS Prescribed Fire and Air Quality Working Group, North Carolina State University, the Southern Fire Exchange, and the University of Florida. Presenters: Scott Davis (EPA R4), Heidi LeSane, (EPA R4), Rick Gillam (EPA R4), Jim Boylan (GA DNR EPD), Randy Strait (NC DEQ AQ), and Jenn Fawcett (SERPPAS/NCSU)
Prescribed fire is an important management tool on federal lands that is not being applied at the necessary or desired levels. Since 2017, we have been investigating policy barriers and opportunities for increasing prescribed fire application on US Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management lands in the Western United States. In the first phase of our work, we found that lack of adequate capacity and funding were the most commonly cited barriers to increasing application of prescribed fire, and that successful approaches rely on collaborative forums and positions that allow for communication, problem-solving, and resource sharing among federal and state partners. In 2019, we completed case studies of locations using unique strategies to increase application of prescribed fire in complex land management contexts. This webinar reports on the primary themes from these case studies, highlighting specific examples of practice from different Forest Service and BLM units.
This webinar provides an introduction and overview of the FlamMap modeling system and its capabilities. FlamMap is a fire analysis desktop application that describes potential fire behavior (spread rate, flame length, fireline intensity, etc.), fire growth and spread and conditional burn probabilities under constant environmental conditions (weather and fuel moisture). Dead fuel moisture and conditioning of dead fuels in each pixel is based on slope, shading, elevation, aspect, and weather. With the inclusion of FARSITE it can now compute wildfire growth and behavior for longer time periods under heterogeneous conditions of terrain, fuels, fuel moistures and weather.)
With the release of FlamMap 6.0 information from completed fire behavior runs (BASIC, STFB, NTFB) from the Wildland Fire Decision Support System (WFDSS) and the Interagency Fuels Treatment Decision Support System (IFTDSS) can be imported directly into FlamMap6 to setup runs. Additionally, a landscape editing tool has been added, the ability to project geospatial data layers, and a full set of tutorials within the Help System to facilitate learning to operate FlamMap.
Humanity’s fire practices are creating the fire equivalent of an ice age. Our shift from burning living landscapes to burning lithic ones is affecting all aspects of Earth. Presenter is Stephen Pyne.
Wildfire is one of the most contentious subjects affecting land managers, land owners, and the public. As a contagious process, the social, political, and ecological ramifications of wildfire response and eventual fire outcomes are not limited to where and when a fire occurs, leaving instead a legacy of effects that can shape the physical and social fabric of a landscape for decades. Fire under the right conditions and in the right locations can restore landscape integrity and help guard against future losses. Fire under the wrong conditions can be catastrophic.
This presentation digs into three years of case studies applying strategic wildfire risk planning, aka “the PODs framework”, to decision support in landscape-scale wildfire planning and during incident-level wildfire response. It discusses successes and failures, challenges of implementation, lessons learned, and current and future applications.