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The increasing incidence of wildfires across the southwestern United States (US) is altering the contemporary forest management template within historically frequent-fire conifer forests. An increasing fraction of southwestern conifer forests have…
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This feature explores topics of enduring ecological concern – fire regimes, climate change, and forest management of the North American West. The authors describe the dual challenges of past forest management legacies and fire exclusion confronted…
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The western United States has suffered increasingly disastrous wildfires in recent years. Massive wildfires have attracted considerable attention from the media and policy makers, and have renewed calls to better understand and mitigate wildfire…
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It is common practice for land managers to thin forests in the western United States and then masticate fuels by mowing, chipping or mulching the downed trees, shrubs and herbaceous vegetation. The thinning reduces canopy fuels and then mastication…
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Abandonment of agricultural land is widespread in many parts of the world, leading to shrub and tree encroachment. The increase of flammable plant biomass, that is, fuel load, increases the risk and intensity of wildfires. Fuel reduction by…
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We present novel in-field vegetation fire observations and the analyses using brightness temperatures recorded by longwave infrared camera and thermal image velocimetry. The brightness temperatures from a wind-driven stubble wheat fire were obtained…
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Wildfire is capable of rapidly releasing the energy stored in forests, with the amount of water in live and dead biomass acting as a regulator on the amount and rate of energy release. Here we used temperature and fuel moisture data to examine…
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Evapotranspiration (ET) accounts for a substantial portion of regional water budgets in much of the southeast and fire-prone western United States (US). Even small changes in ET rates can translate to meaningful shifts in runoff patterns and makes…
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Implementation of wildfire- and climate-adaptation strategies in seasonally dry forests of western North America is impeded by numerous constraints and uncertainties. After more than a century of resource and land use change, some question the need…
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We review science-based adaptation strategies for western North American (wNA) forests that include restoring active fire regimes and fostering resilient structure and composition of forested landscapes. As part of the review, we address common…
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Forest landscapes across western North America (wNA) have experienced extensive changes over the last two centuries, while climatic warming has become a global reality over the last 4 decades. Resulting interactions between historical increases in…
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Recent extreme wildfire seasons in the United States (US) have rekindled policy debates about the underlying drivers and potential role forest management can play in reducing fuels and future wildfire. Most US western national forests face a…
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Over the past century the size and severity of wildfires, as well as post-fire recovery processes (e.g., seedling establishment), have been altered from historical levels due to management policies and changing climate. Tree seedling establishment…
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For over 20 years, forest fuel reduction has been the dominant management action in western US forests. These same actions have also been associated with the restoration of highly altered frequent-fire forests. Perhaps the vital element in the…
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Managed wildfires, naturally ignited wildfires that are managed for resource benefit, have the potential to reduce fuel loads and minimize the effects of future wildfires, but have been utilized mainly in remote settings. A new policy federal…
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As land managers strive to implement the National Cohesive Wildland Fire Management Strategy, guidance is critically needed on where and how landscape fuel reduction treatments can mitigate future fire impacts and assist in active fire management.…
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Computational models of wildfires are necessary for operational prediction and risk assessment. These models require accurate spatial fuel data and remote sensing techniques have ability to provide high spatial resolution raster data for landscapes…
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Fire is a powerful environmental disturbance with the ability to shape many biomes worldwide. However, global warming, land-use changes and other anthropogenic factors have strongly altered natural fire regimes worldwide. Despite the growing number…
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Expert opinion can be a valuable tool for informed decision making. Concerning wildfire susceptibility reduction at the landscape scale, forest ecosystem experts play a key role in offering advice about appropriate fuel management practices to be…
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The effectiveness of a fuelbreak, created in a homogeneous grassland on a flat terrain, was studied numerically. The analysis relies on 3D numerical simulations that were performed using a detailed physical-fire-model (FIRESTAR3D) based on a…
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