Research Database
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6
Five-year legacy of wildfire and salvage logging impacts on nutrient runoff and aquatic plant, invertebrate, and fish productivity
Year: 2014
Ecohydrological linkages between phosphorus (P) production, stream algae, benthic invertebrate, and fish communities were studied for 4 years after severe wildfire in the Rocky Mountains (Alberta, Canada). Mean concentrations of all forms of P (soluble reactive, total dissolved, particulate, and total) were 2 to 13 times greater in burned and post-fire salvage-logged streams than in unburned streams (p < 0.001). Post-disturbance recovery of P was slow with differences in P-discharge relationships still evident 5 years after the fire (p < 0.001). Coupled P and sediment interactions were…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Wildfire and the Future of Water Supply
Year: 2014
In many parts of the world, forests provide high quality water for domestic, agricultural, industrial, and ecological needs, with water supplies in those regions inextricably linked to forest health. Wildfires have the potential to have devastating effects on aquatic ecosystems and community drinking water supply through impacts on water quantity and quality. In recent decades, a combination of fuel load accumulation, climate change, extensive droughts, and increased human presence in forests have resulted in increases in area burned and wildfire severity—a trend predicted to continue. Thus,…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Recent mountain pine beetle outbreaks, wildfire severity, and postfire tree regeneration in the US Northern Rockies
Year: 2014
Widespread tree mortality caused by outbreaks of native bark beetles (Circulionidae: Scolytinae) in recent decades has raised concern among scientists and forest managers about whether beetle outbreaks fuel more ecologically severe forest fires and impair postfire resilience. To investigate this question, we collected extensive field data following multiple fires that burned subalpine forests in 2011 throughout the Northern Rocky Mountains across a spectrum of prefire beetle outbreak severity, primarily from mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae). We found that recent (2001–2010)…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Catchment-scale stream temperature response to land disturbance by wildfire governed by surface–subsurface energy exchange and atmospheric controls
Year: 2014
In 2003, the Lost Creek wildfire severely burned 21,000 hectares of forest on the eastern slopes of the Canadian Rocky Mountains. Seven headwater catchments with varying levels of disturbance (burned, post-fire salvage logged, and unburned) were instrumented as part of the Southern Rockies Watershed Project to measure streamflow, stream temperature, and meteorological conditions. From 2004 to 2010 mean annual stream temperature (Ts) was elevated 0.8–2.1 [1]C in the burned and post-fire salvage logged streams compared to the unburned streams. Mean daily maximum Ts was 1.0–3.0 [1]C warmer and…
Publication Type: Journal Article
The Ecology and Management of Moist Mixed-Conifer Forests in Eastern Oregon and Washington: a Synthesis of the Relevant Biophysical Science and Implications for Future Land Management
Year: 2014
Land managers in the Pacific Northwest have reported a need for updated scientific information on the ecology and management of mixed-conifer forests east of the Cascade Range in Oregon and Washington. Of particular concern are the moist mixed-conifer forests, which have become drought-stressed and vulnerable to high-severity fire after decades of human disturbances and climate warming. This synthesis responds to this need. We present a compilation of existing research across multiple natural resource issues, including disturbance regimes, the legacy effects of past management actions,…
Publication Type: Report
Fire and fuels
Year: 2014
Recent studies of historical fire regimes indicate that fires occurring prior to Euro-American settlement were characterized by a high degree of spatial complexity that was driven by heterogeneity in vegetation/fuels and topography and influenced by variability in climate, which mediated the timing, effects, and extents of fires over time. Although there are many important lessons to learn from the past, we may not be able to rely completely on past forest conditions to provide us with blueprints for current and future forest management. Rather than attempting to achieve a particular forest…
Publication Type: Report