Research Database

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Untrammeling the wilderness: restoring natural conditions through the return of human-ignited fire

Year: 2024

Historical and contemporary policies and practices, including the suppression of lightning-ignited fires and the removal of intentional fires ignited by Indigenous peoples, have resulted in over a century of fire exclusion across many of the USA’s landscapes. Within many designated wilderness areas, this intentional exclusion of fire has clearly altered ecological processes and thus constitutes a fundamental and ubiquitous act of trammeling. Through a framework that recognizes four orders of trammeling, we demonstrate the substantial, long-term, and negative effects of fire…

Fire Effects and Fire Ecology, Fire History, Restoration and Hazardous Fuel Reduction

wilderness fire, fire exclusion, Indigenous fire stewardship, fire-adapted ecosystems

Publication Type: Journal Article

Changing fire regimes and nuanced impacts on a critically imperiled species

Year: 2024

Wildfire activity throughout western North America is increasing which can have important consequences for species persistence. Native species have evolved disturbance-adapted traits that confer resilience to natural disturbance provided disturbances operate within their historical range of variability. This resilience can erode as disturbance regimes change and begin operating outside this range. We assessed wildfire impacts during 1987–2018 on the northern spotted owl, an imperiled species with complex relationships with late and early seral forest in the Pacific Northwest, USA. We analyzed…

Fire Effects and Fire Ecology, Fire History, Fish and Wildlife Habitat

northern spotted owl, wildlife habitat, disturbance regime

Publication Type: Journal Article