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Regime shifts from one ecological state to another are often portrayed as sudden, dramatic, and difficult to reverse. Yet many regime shifts unfold slowly and imperceptibly after a tipping point has been exceeded, especially at regional and global…
Author(s): Terry P. Hughes, Cristina Linares, Vasilis Dakos, Ingrid A. van de Leemput, Egbert H. van Nes
Year Published:

Because of their broad range, variations in population traits and characteristics across this range, and the variability in habitat conditions and threats within this range, conservation of sage-grouse is a unique challenge compared to isolated or…
Author(s): D.J. Manier, D.J.A. Wood, Z.H. Bowen, R.M. Donovan, M.J. Holloran, L.M. Juliusson, K.S. Mayne, S.J. Oyler-McCance, F.R. Quamen, D.J. Saher, A.J. Titolo
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Consequences of bark beetle outbreaks for forest wildfire potential are receiving heightened attention, but little research has considered ecosystems with mixed-severity fire regimes. Such forests are widespread, variable in stand structure, and…
Author(s): Daniel C. Donato, Brian J. Harvey, William H. Romme, Martin Simard, Monica G. Turner
Year Published:

Bark beetle outbreaks are a major disturbance of forests throughout western North America affecting ecological processes and social and economic values (Amman 1977, Bond and Keeley 2005). Since the 1990s, bark beetle outbreaks have affected between…
Author(s): Chad M. Hoffman, Carolyn Hull Sieg, Penelope Morgan, William E. Mell, Rodman Linn, Camille Stevens-Rumann, Joel D. McMillin, Russell A. Parsons, Helen Maffei
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Forests are major components of the carbon cycle, and disturbances are important influences of forest carbon. Our objective was to contribute to the understanding of forest carbon cycling by quantifying the amount of carbon in trees killed by two…
Author(s): Jeffrey A. Hicke, Arjan J. H. Meddens, Craig D. Allen, Crystal A. Kolden
Year Published:

Global forests capture and store significant amounts of CO2 through photosynthesis. When carbon is removed from forests through harvest, a portion of the harvested carbon is stored in wood products, often for many decades. The United States Forest…
Author(s): Nathaniel Anderson, Jesse Young, Keith Stockmann, Kenneth E. Skog, Sean P. Healey, Dan R. Loeffler, J. Greg Jones, James F. Morrison
Year Published:

As part of the 13th Whitebark Pine Ecosystem Science and Management Workshop - Challenges of Whitebark Pine Restoration, participants visited a whitebark pine restoration area near Fairy Lake in the Bridger Mountains north of Bozeman, MT (Figure 1…
Author(s): Corey L. Gucker
Year Published:

I examined the hypothesis that traditional social-ecological fire systems around the world include common elements of traditional fire knowledge (TFK). I defined TFK as fire-related knowledge, beliefs, and practices that have been developed and…
Author(s): Mary R. Huffman
Year Published:

While North American ecosystems vary widely in their ecology and natural historical fire regimes, they are unified in benefitting from prescribed fire when judiciously applied with the goal of maintaining and restoring native ecosystem composition,…
Author(s): Association for Fire Ecology, International Association of Wildland Fire, Tall Timbers Research Station, The Nature Conservancy
Year Published:

Climatic change is anticipated to alter disturbance regimes for many ecosystems. Among the most important effects are changes in the frequency, size, and intensity of wildfires. Serotiny (long-term canopy storage and the heat-induced release of…
Author(s): Brian Buma, Carissa D. Brown, Daniel C. Donato, Joseph B. Fontaine, Jill F. Johnstone
Year Published:

This review synthesizes the state of knowledge on fire effects on vegetation and soils in semi-arid ecosystems in the Great Basin Region, including the central and northern Great Basin and Range, Columbia River Basin, and the Snake River Plain. We…
Author(s): Richard F. Miller, Jeanne C. Chambers, David A. Pyke, Frederick B. Pierson
Year Published:

Purposeful introductions of exotic species for rehabilitation efforts following wildfire are common on rangelands in the western United States, though ecological impacts of exotic species in novel environments are often poorly understood. One such…
Author(s): Erin C. Gray, Patricia S. Muir
Year Published:

Widespread outbreaks of the mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae Hopkins) in the lodgepole pine (Pinus contorta Dougl. ex Loud. var. latifolia Engelm.) forests of North America have produced stands with significant levels of recent tree…
Author(s): Wesley G. Page, Michael J. Jenkins, Martin E. Alexander
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Increasing fire frequencies and uncharacteristic severe fires have created a need for improved restoration methods across rangelands in western North America. Traditional restoration seed mixtures of native perennial mid- to late-seral plant species…
Author(s): Christopher M. Herron, Jayne L. Jonas, Paul J. Meiman, Mark W. Paschke
Year Published:

Recent bark beetle outbreaks have had a significant impact on forests throughout western North America and have generated concerns about interactions and feedbacks between beetle attacks and fire. However, research has been hindered by a lack of…
Author(s): Chad M. Hoffman, Penelope Morgan, William E. Mell, Russell A. Parsons, Eva K. Strand, Stephen Cook
Year Published:

Settlement by Anglo-Americans in the desert shrublands of North America has resulted in the introduction and subsequent invasion of multiple nonnative invasive grass species. These invasions have altered pre-settlement fire regimes, converted native…
Author(s): Matthew L. Brooks, Jeanne C. Chambers
Year Published:

1) Conservation partners across 11 western states are rallying in unprecedented fashion to reduce threats to sage-grouse and the sagebrush ecosystem they occupy. 2) Improvements made in the Bureau of Land Management's (BLM) wildfire policy are…
Author(s): Tim Murphy, David E. Naugle, Randall Eardley, Jeremy D. Maestas, Tim Griffiths, Michael L. Pellant, San J. Stiver
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Non-native, invasive grasses have been linked to altered grass-fire cycles worldwide. Although a few studies have quantified resulting changes in fire activity at local scales, and many have speculated about larger scales, regional alterations to…
Author(s): Jennifer Balch, Bethany A. Bradley, Carla M. D'Antonio, Jose Gomez-Dans
Year Published:

Understanding how disturbances interact to shape ecosystems is a key challenge in ecology. In forests of western North America, the degree to which recent bark beetle outbreaks and subsequent fires may be linked (e.g., outbreak severity affects fire…
Author(s): Brian J. Harvey, Daniel C. Donato, William H. Romme, Monica G. Turner
Year Published:

Whitebark pine (Pinus albicaulis Engelm.) is in serious decline across its range, largely due to the combined effects of Cronartium ribicola J. C. Fisch (an introduced fungal pathogen that causes white pine blister rust), replacement by late…
Author(s): Lauren Fins, Ben Hoppus
Year Published: