Mesic mixed-conifer forests are resilient to both historical high-severity fire and contemporary reburns in the US Northern Rocky Mountains

Jaffe, Melissa R.; Kreider, Mark R.; Affleck, David L. R.; Higuera, Philip E.; Seielstad, Carl; Parks, Sean A.; Larson, Andrew J.

doi:10.1016/j.foreco.2023.121283

Cited by 6 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 55 publications

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“…Additionally, recent eld surveys of burn scars in the Northern Rockies indicate abundant conifer regeneration and survival when close to a seed source (Clark-Wolf, Higuera, and Davis 2022). Similarly, Jaffe et al (2023) documented abundant conifer regeneration across all re histories in mixed conifer forests of the Selway-Bitterroot wilderness. Further west, Povak et al (2020) also found signi cant regeneration following wild re in mixed conifer forests of the Okanogan Highlands and Eastern Cascades, which they partially attribute to mild post re weather conditions that may have reduced water stress on seedlings.…”

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confidence: 86%

Event-scale impact and recovery of forest cover following wildfire in the Northern Rocky Mountains

Epstein,

Seielstad,

Moran

2023

Preprint

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Anthropogenic climate change is expected to catalyze forest conversion to grass and shrublands due to more extreme fire behavior and hotter and drier post-fire conditions. However, field surveys of wilderness areas in the Northern Rocky Mountains of the United States show robust conifer regeneration on burned sites. This study utilizes a machine learning (GBM) approach to systematically monitor canopy cover on burned areas in two large wilderness areas from 1985 to 2021. The predictive model was developed from coincident LiDAR and Landsat observations and used to create time series of canopy cover on 352 burned sites. Fire impact, as measured by canopy cover loss relative to pre-fire condition, was highly correlated with burn severity. Recovery was characterized by two metrics: whether or not a site exhibited signs of recovery, and the rate at which a site is recovering. Eighty-five percent of the land area studied showed evidence of recovery. Burned areas that are failing to recover are occurring more recently than their recovering counterparts, with 60% of non-recovering sites burning for the first time after 2003. However, the 5-year probability of recovery is similar among recent burns and for those that burned earlier in the record, suggesting that they may recover with more time. Once sites begin recovering, median time to reach pre-fire state is 40 years. Seven sites have projected recovery times greater than two hundred years, six of which burned for the first time after 2006. While fires that are failing to recover or recovering slowly make up proportionally small portions of the landscape, they may be of particular management interest as harbingers of future forest conversion, particularly under hotter and drier future climate scenarios. This work provides a framework for systematic monitoring into the future and establishes a baseline of recovery in the mountains of western Montana and northern Idaho.

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confidence: 86%

Event-scale impact and recovery of forest cover following wildfire in the Northern Rocky Mountains

Epstein,

Seielstad,

Moran

2023

Preprint

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Forest resilience and post-fire conifer regeneration in the southern Cascades, Lassen Volcanic National Park California, USA

Niziolek,

Harris,

Taylor

2024

Forest Ecology and Management

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Principles of fire ecology

Kobziar,

Hiers,

Belcher

et al. 2024

fire ecol

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Fire ecology is a complex discipline that can only be understood by integrating biological, physical, and social sciences. The science of fire ecology explores wildland fire’s mechanisms and effects across all scales of time and space. However, the lack of defined, organizing concepts in fire ecology dilutes its collective impact on knowledge and management decision-making and makes the discipline vulnerable to misunderstanding and misappropriation. Fire ecology has matured as a discipline and deserves an enunciation of its unique emergent principles of organization. Most scientific disciplines have established theories, laws, and principles that have been tested, debated, and adopted by the discipline’s practitioners. Such principles reflect the consensus of current knowledge, guide methodology and interpretation, and expose knowledge gaps in a coherent and structured way. In this manuscript, we introduce five comprehensive principles to define the knowledge fire ecology has produced and provide a framework to support the continued development and impact of the fire ecology discipline.

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Mesic mixed-conifer forests are resilient to both historical high-severity fire and contemporary reburns in the US Northern Rocky Mountains

Cited by 6 publications

References 55 publications

Event-scale impact and recovery of forest cover following wildfire in the Northern Rocky Mountains

Event-scale impact and recovery of forest cover following wildfire in the Northern Rocky Mountains

Forest resilience and post-fire conifer regeneration in the southern Cascades, Lassen Volcanic National Park California, USA

Principles of fire ecology

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