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Conifer forest resilience may be threatened by increasing wildfire activity and compound disturbances in western North America. Fire refugia enhance forest resilience, yet may decline over time due to delayed mortality—a process that remains poorly…
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Scientists have spent decades trying to understand how to best promote resilient forests and reduce fuels. A golden endeavor certainly. Is the best approach using a series of prescribed burns? Or is it mechanically cutting trees? Or does the…
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We find that wildfire are part of a distinct temporal pattern of soil moisture, vegetation water content and atmospheric dryness dynamics that begin about 5 months before the incidents. We analyze anomalies in soil moisture, vegetation water…
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Wildfires in forested ecosystems are increasing in severity and extent. The adaptations many plants have acquired in response to their natural fire regime may not be sufficient to allow some species to persist. This could impact the forest…
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Quaking aspen (Populus tremuloides Michx.) stands throughout the western United States provide valuable ecosystem services but can be lost via succession from aspen to conifer. Forest managers are cutting conifers, but disposal of cut wood can be…
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Fuel treatments are commonly applied to increase resilience to wildfire in dry and historically frequent-fire forests of western North America. The long-term effects of fuel treatments on forest structure, fuel profiles (amount and configuration of…
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Climate change resulting from increased concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide ([CO2]) is expected to result in warmer temperatures and changed precipitation regimes during this century. In the northwestern U.S., these changes will likely…
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The US National Fire Plan (NFP) is among the largest forest-restoration initiatives worldwide, removing wildland fuels on about 11 million hectares and costing over $6 billion. We evaluated the extent to which areas treated under the NFP-from 2004…
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In the Pacific northwestern(PNW)region of North America, climatic conditions have significantlywarmed since a predominantly cool phase of the Pacific North American circulation patterns between 1950 and 1975. What are the implications of this shift…
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Natural disturbances play a key role in ecosystem dynamics and are important factors for sustainable forest ecosystem management. Quantitative models are frequently employed to tackle the complexities associated with disturbance processes. Here we…
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Greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) is a high priority species for federal and state land management agencies. Sage-grouse are sagebrush (Artemisia spp.) obligates requiring sagebrush for their survival throughout the year. Sagebrush has…
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The greater sage-grouse is at the center of a complex challenge to conserve sagebrush ecosystems. The species has declined across much of its range, including 11 western states and 2 Canadian provinces, mostly due to loss of critical sagebrush…
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Vegetation change and anthropogenic development are altering ecosystems and decreasing biodiversity. Successful management of ecosystems threatened by multiple stressors requires development of ecosystem conservation plans rather than single species…
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Climate change is projected to profoundly influence vegetation patterns and community compositions, either directly through increased species mortality and shifts in species distributions or indirectly through disturbance dynamics such as increased…
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The concept of resilience is now frequently invoked by natural resource agencies in the US. This reflects growing trends within ecology, conservation biology, and other disciplines acknowledging that social–ecological systems require management…
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The goal of this guide is to provide a resource for managers of mixed conifer forests of the Southwestern plateaus and uplands, the Central and Southern Rocky Mountains, the Sierra Nevada, and the Transverse and Peninsular Ranges in Southern…
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Whitebark pine (Pinus albicaulis) has been declining across much of its range in North America because of the combined effects of mountain pine beetle epidemics, fire exclusion policies, and widespread exotic blister rust infections. Whitebark pine…
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Many ecologically important, five-needle white pine forests that historically dominated the high elevation landscapes of western North America are now being heavily impacted by mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus spp.) outbreaks, the exotic disease…
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This paper synthesizes existing information about the disturbance ecology of high-elevation five-needle pine ecosystems, describing disturbances regimes, how they are changing or are expected to change, and the implications for ecosystem persistence…
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High elevation five-needle pines are rapidly declining throughout North America. The six species, whitebark (Pinus albicaulis Engelm.), limber (P. flexilis James), southwestern white (P. strobiformis Engelm.), foxtail (P. balfouriana Grev. &…
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