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Drought and mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae Hopkins) outbreaks have affected millions of hectares of high-elevation conifer forests in the Northern Rocky Mountains during the past century. Little research has examined the distinction…
Author(s): Saskia L. van de Gevel, Evan R. Larson, Henri D. Grissino-Mayer
Year Published:

Previous studies have suggested that bark beetles and fires can be interacting disturbances, whereby bark beetle– caused tree mortality can alter the risk and severity of subsequent wildland fires. However, there remains considerable uncertainty…
Author(s): Carolyn Hull Sieg, Rodman Linn, F. Pimont, Chad M. Hoffman, Joel D. McMillin, Judith Winterkamp, Scott L. Baggett
Year Published:

Recent mountain pine beetle outbreaks in whitebark pine forests have been extensive and severe. Understanding the climate influences on these outbreaks is essential for developing management plans that account for potential future mountain pine…
Author(s): Polly C. Buotte, Jeffrey A. Hicke, Haiganoush K. Preisler, John T. Abatzoglou, Kenneth F. Raffa, Jesse A. Logan
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Wildfire behavior depends on the type, quantity, and condition of fuels, and the effect that bark beetle outbreaks have on fuels is a topic of current research and debate. Remote sensing can provide estimates of fuels across landscapes, although few…
Author(s): Benjamin C. Bright, Andrew T. Hudak, Arjan J. H. Meddens, Todd J. Hawbaker, Jennifer S. Briggs, Robert E. Kennedy
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The recent mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae Hopkins) epidemic has affected millions of hectares of conifer forests in the Rocky Mountains. Land managers are interested in using biomass from beetle-killed trees for bioenergy and biobased…
Author(s): Woodam Chung, Paul Evangelista, Nathaniel Anderson, Anthony Vorster, Hee Han, Krishna Poudel, Robert Sturtevant
Year Published:

Forests are substantially influenced by disturbances, and therefore accurate information about the location, timing, and magnitude of disturbances is important for understanding effects. In the western United States, the two major disturbance agents…
Author(s): Jeffrey A. Hicke, Arjan J. H. Meddens, Crystal A. Kolden
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Extensive outbreaks of bark beetles have killed trees across millions of hectares of forests and woodlands in western North America. These outbreaks have led to spirited scientific, public, and policy debates about consequential increases in fire…
Author(s): Dominik Kulakowski, Nathan Mietkiewicz
Year Published:

Understanding the causes and consequences of rapid environmental change is an essential scientific frontier, particularly given the threat of climate- and land use-induced changes in disturbance regimes. In western North America, recent widespread…
Author(s): Garrett W. Meigs, Harold S. Zald, John L. Campbell, William S. Keeton, Robert E. Kennedy
Year Published:

Fire frequency in low-elevation coniferous forests in western North America has greatly declined since the late 1800s. In many areas, this has increased tree density and the proportion of shade-tolerant species, reduced resource availability, and…
Author(s): Sharon M. Hood, Stephen P. Baker, Anna Sala
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Wildfires have increased in western North America, creating extensive areas of regenerating forests. There is concern that recent large, stand-replacing fires will synchronize forest development and commit landscapes to a future of increased…
Author(s): Rupert Seidl, Daniel C. Donato, Kenneth F. Raffa, Monica G. Turner
Year Published:

The causes of bark beetle outbreaks - particularly the role of disturbances - are poorly understood. Stand-scale disturbances, like fires, can suddenly improve local host susceptibility and may attract beetles; however, whether such increases can…
Author(s): Crisia A. Tabacaru, Jane Park, Nadir Erbilgin
Year Published:

Removal of fire-killed trees (i.e. post-fire or salvage logging) is often conducted in part to reduce woody fuel loads and mitigate potential reburn effects. Studies of post-salvage fuel dynamics have primarily used chronosequence or modelling…
Author(s): John L. Campbell, Daniel C. Donato, Joseph B. Fontaine
Year Published:

Increased wildfire activity and recent bark beetle outbreaks in the western United States have increased the potential for interactions between disturbance types to influence forest characteristics. However, the effects of interactions between bark…
Author(s): Camille Stevens-Rumann, Penelope Morgan, Chad M. Hoffman
Year Published:

In the western United States, mountain pine beetles (MPBs) have killed pine trees across 71,000 km2 of forest since the mid-1990s, leading to widespread concern that abundant dead fuels may increase area burned and exacerbate fire behavior. Although…
Author(s): Sarah Hart, Tania L. Schoennagel, Thomas T. Veblen, Teresa B. Chapman
Year Published:

Patches of live, dead, and dying trees resulting from bark beetle-caused mortality alter spatial and temporal variability in the canopy and surface fuel complex through changes in the foliar moisture content of attacked trees and through the…
Author(s): Chad M. Hoffman, Rodman Linn, Russell A. Parsons, Carolyn Hull Sieg, Judith Winterkamp
Year Published:

Induced defense is a common plant strategy in response to herbivory. Although abiotic damage, such as physical wounding, pruning, and heating, can induce plant defense, the effect of such damage by large-scale abiotic disturbances on induced…
Author(s): Sharon M. Hood, Anna Sala, Emily K. Heyerdahl, Marion Boutin
Year Published:

Bark beetle outbreaks and wildfires are principal drivers of change in western North American forests, and both have increased in severity and extent in recent years. These two agents of disturbance interact in complex ways to shape forest structure…
Author(s): Michael J. Jenkins, Justin B. Runyon, Christopher J. Fettig, Wesley G. Page, Barbara J. Bentz
Year Published:

Wildfire and mountain pine beetle infestations are naturally occurring disturbances in western North American forests. Black-backed woodpeckers (Picoides arcticus) are emblematic of the role these disturbances play in creating wildlife habitat,…
Author(s): Christopher T. Rota, Joshua J. Millspaugh, Mark A. Rumble, Chad P. Lehman, Dillon C. Kesler
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While the use of timber harvests is generally accepted as an effective approach to controlling bark beetles during outbreaks, in reality there has been a dearth of monitoring to assess outcomes, and failures are often not reported. Additionally, few…
Author(s): Diana L. Six, Eric Biber, Elisabeth Long
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Tiny insects called bark beetles have devastated forests in western North America over the past decade. Life has drained from millions of hectares of forest so quickly that it seemed as if they had been abruptly unplugged, like a Christmas tree…
Author(s): Cally Carswell
Year Published: