Cataloging Information
Ecological - First Order
Soil Heating
Ecological - Second Order
Soils
Fuels
Fuel Treatments & Effects
Recovery after fire
The proposed research will help managers understand how early soil ecosystem responses to fuel reduction treatments with prescribed fire may or may not be indicative of longer term responses. This research is necessary for better establishing, in forest management plans and decision documents, the ecosystem costs and benefits of lessening the risk of stand-replacing wildfire through fire and fire surrogate (FFS) fuel reduction treatments. Early impacts of the restoration treatments at the Hungry Bob FFS research site in the Blue Mountains of northeastern Oregon indicate that both treatments with burning (prescribed burn only, and thinned and prescribed burn) significantly reduced live root biomass, ectomycorrhizal fungal (EMF) species, and duff levels compared to the non-burned treatments (thinned only, non-thinned and non-burned). These results raise questions about whether managers can achieve the desired future condition of stands with large-tree retention and low fuel loads. EMF mortality and complete duff reduction after fire have been implicated with poor tree survival and slow stand recovery in forest ecosystems world-wide. The proposed research will extend our assessment beyond the immediate-effects stages to a period of time more meaningful to managers seeking to understand fuel reduction impacts on soil productivity. Re-measurement of EMF, fine roots, and duff in 2013 will provide information on treatment effects 15 years post-thinning and 13 years post-burning. No significant management has occurred since the stands were subjected to thinning (1998) and burning (2000), and all prior datasets are available.