Fuels & Fuel Treatments
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This webinar discusses how targeted grazing can reduce fuels to prevent wildfire in shrub-grasslands. Chris Schachtschneider, Eva Strand, and Scott Jensen, University of Idaho, present.
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The importance of cost effective fuel treatment programs has appeared consistently in federal directives (FLAME ACT, National Cohesive Strategy, U.S Department of Interior Office of Policy Analysis) as a priority. Implementing cost effective fuel treatment programs requires a spatially explicit and integrated systematic approach that can be applied to the landscape, program and national scale. The objectives of this study were three-fold. The first objective was to generate cost effective fuel treatment programs at the landscape scale and their impact on the preparedness program. The second objective was to quantify the interrelationship between the fuel program and preparedness program by budget alternative at a landscape scale to provide mangers with the fuel and preparedness budgets that achieve the highest return on investment for any combination of budgets. The third objective was to form cost effective national and regional fuel treatment programs based on the data collected from the landscape analysis that considers national and regional policies.
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We evaluated two juniper removal treatments (Fall, Spring) to restore aspen woodlands in southeast Oregon, spanning a 15-year period. The Fall treatment involved cutting 1/3 of the juniper followed by a high severity broadcast burn one year later in October 2001. The Spring treatment involved cutting 2/3 of the juniper followed by a low severity broadcast burn 18 months later in April 2002. After 15 years, aspen density in the Spring treatment was about 1/3 of the Fall treatment, however, aspen cover did not differ from the Fall treatment. Because spring burning was less effective at removing juniper, leaving about 20% of the mature trees and 50% of the saplings, retreatment of conifers will be necessary to maintain the aspen community. If an objective is to maintain or increase native understories the Spring treatment was more effective than the Fall treatment for recovering the shrub layer.
Developing Treatment Alternatives
Treatment comparison is one of the more complex parts of the IFTDSS app. There’s no doubt that comparing landscapes is tricky business. If you find yourself scratching your head or staring at the screen a lot, join us to help take some of the mystery out of landscape comparisons! Recorded 13 April 2018.
Modeling and Reports
The beauty of IFTDSS is that nearly everything is exportable as a report or summary. With a fairly large number of items on each report it’s easy to get lost. Join us to take some of the mystery out of IFTDSS reports and reporting. Recorded 30 March 2018.
Landscapes and Editing
Trying to figure out how to edit landscapes in IFTDSS or just interested in picking up some tips and tricks to do it better? This webinar is for those trying to learn how to edit landscapes in IFTDSS to better represent their area! Recorded 23 March 2018.
IFTDSS Map Studio Demonstration
In this webinar we demonstrate using Map Studio for finding an area of interest, adding landscapes and model runs, and working with shapes and shapefiles. Recorded 16 March 2018.
Navigating IFTDSS
This demonstration highlights the overall layout of IFTDSS. It includes the Planning Cycle, file storage in My Workspace, Map Studio interface, and Modeling Playground. Recorded 9 March 2018.
IFTDSS Demonstration and Discussion
This demonstration of IFTDSS, and the following discussion, was a presentation to the Fire Science Exchange Network on September 21, 2017.
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While fuel treatments in the dry conifer forests of the inland western U.S. are effective at reducing wildfire spread and severity at the stand-level, how effective are they at changing wildfire activity at the landscape scale? And will current management practices be sufficient as forests and climate change over the next century? Brooke Cassell presents the results of her recently-defended dissertation on the effects of fuel treatments in the southern Malheur National Forest and surrounding landscape. This study used a dynamic forest landscape model to compare alternative management strategies’ effects on wildfire activity under contemporary and extreme weather scenarios.
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This report concerns a small facet of the JFSP-funded MASTIDON study in which summaries of the physical and chemical fuel properties of the sampled masticated fuelbeds were presented and the relationships of these properties to fuel age were explored. The scientist documented masticated fuelbed characteristics and correlated these characteristics to fuelbed age for ponderosa pine and mixed conifer stands of the US Rocky Mountains that were masticated using four techniques.
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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.
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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.
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The World of Wildland Fire vision is to provide and connect fire science educators, trainers, and the public with scientifically solid and peer-reviewed teaching tools and techniques, using state-of-the-art materials, which will be free and accessible to all. This is done to significantly enhance the learning experience.
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Abstracts of Recent Papers on Range Management in the West. Prepared by Charlie Clements, Rangeland Scientist, USDA Agricultural Research Service, Reno, NV.