Fuels & Fuel Treatments
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Our results suggest that bird communities in piñon-juniper woodlands can be highly stable when management treatments are conducted in areas with more advanced woodland development and at the level of disturbance measured in our study.
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This study investigated the effects of mastication and hand-thinning treatments in piñon-juniper (PJ) woodlands on ecological processes including fire, and on a wide range of species, particularly vulnerable PJ obligate birds. Treatments drove major, persistent ecological shifts relative to controls. Tree cover and canopy fuels were reduced; concomitantly, down woody surface fuels, forb, and grass cover increased. Treatments exhibited rapid, large, and persistent increases in the frequency, richness, and cover of 20 non-native plant species including cheatgrass. Treatments substantially reduced the occupancy of piñon-juniper specialist and conifer obligate bird species.
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This bulletin summarizes the evaluation of more than 40 years of satellite imagery to determine what happens when a fire burns into a previously burned area. Results from this research are helping land managers to assess whether a previous wildland fire will act as a fuel treatment based on the length of time since the previous fire and local conditions such as ecosystem type, topography, and fire weather conditions. By factoring in the ecological benefits of fire, land managers are able to manage fire in a way that fosters more resilient landscapes.
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This report examines federal officials’ and stakeholders’ views on (1) factors that affect federal-nonfederal collaboration aimed at reducing wildland fire risk to communities and (2) actions that could improve their ability to reduce risk to communities.
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This meta-analysis was conducted to determine if there were consistent responses of understory vegetation to fire and thinning treatments in North American forests that historically experienced frequent surface fire regimes (<20 year fire-return interval, FRI). The most consistent effect of the treatments was the increase in non-native species following mechanical thinning and reduction in shrub cover following a burn. These differences suggest the two treatments may not be surrogates in the short-term (less than 5 years). Prescribed fire and thinning treatments can be used successfully to restore understory species richness and cover, but they can create different conditions and these potentially different outcomes need to be considered in the planning of a fuels reduction treatment.
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This study investigated effects of fall grazing, spring grazing and not grazing on fuel characteristics, fire ignition and initial spread during the wildfire season (July and August) at five shrub steppe sites in Oregon, USA. Both grazing treatments decreased fine fuel biomass, cover and height, and increased fuel moisture, and thereby decreased ignition and initial spread compared with the ungrazed treatment. However, the probability of initial spread was 6-fold greater in the fall-grazed compared with the spring-grazed treatment in August. This suggests that spring grazing may have a greater effect on fires than fall grazing, likely because fall grazing does not influence the current year’s plant growth.
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This study analyzed existing permanent monitoring plot data collected between 1995 and 2010 to assess achievement of management objectives related to prescribed fire in ponderosa pine forests. Following first entry fire, ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa var. scopulorum) and Gambel oak (Quercus gambelii) overstory and midstory densities declined between 10% and 45% and effectively shifted the Gambel oak diameter distribution toward larger trees. Second entry fires had a greater effect, reducing ponderosa pine and Gambel oak overstory and midstory densities between 24% and 92%. Diameter distributions of both species shifted toward fewer, larger trees following second entry fires. Total fuel load was reduced by <20% in first entry fires and by half in second entry fires. Several objectives identified by the National Park Service (e.g., overstory ponderosa pine reduction) were not achieved with either fire entry; however, power analysis indicated that sample sizes were not adequate to fully detect long term changes following first entry fires.
Access MoD-FIS tool.
The MoD-FIS tool seasonally modulates fuel model data in the Great Basin and Southwest regions. MoD-FIS incorporates seasonal variability of herbaceous cover. These fine fuel measurements are then used to capture changes to fire behavior fuel models based on the current fire season herbaceous production.
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This synthesis updated the Conservation Effects Assessment Project (CEAP) review and broadened the discussion of prescribed fire as a global management practice. It reviews and summarizes prescribed fire literature available through Web of Science using search terms in the title. The majority of literature (40%) evaluated plant responses to fire with fire behavior and management (29%), wildlife and arthropods (12%), soils (11%), and air quality (4%) evaluated less frequently. Generally, fire effects on plants are neutral to positive and the majority of negative responses lasted less than 2 years. Similarly, soil responses were recovered within 2 yr after burning. However, most studies did not report how long treatments were in place (62%) or the size of experimental units (52%).
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The USGS developed a dataset that estimates 2017 herbaceous annual percent cover predicted on May 1st with an emphasis on annual grasses. These data were developed to provide land managers and researchers with early-season, near-real-time predictions of spatially explicit percent cover predictions of herbaceous annual vegetation in the study area.
This data comes with several caveats. First, as an early-season dataset, it will not reflect the end-of-season estimated percent cover of annual grass in many areas. In fact, some areas with annual grass cover will reflect no cover at this early date. Second, these estimates should be viewed as relative abundances. Third, each pixel in the dataset represent 250-meters and can include a geolocation error of up to 125 meters. Comparing this dataset to similar datasets with different spatial resolutions can lead to substantial differences between datasets. Fourth, this dataset represents annual herbaceous for 2017 forecast on May 1. This dataset is a forecast, and mapping could improve with later map development dates (e.g., July 1). This forecast is considered accurate and reasonable given this early season of mapping.