Research Database
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5
The "strings attached" to community difference and potential pathways to fire adaptiveness in the wildland urban interface
Year: 2021
This article identifies specific social characteristics in two wildland urban interface communities that may have significant impacts on the ability of those communities to adapt to wildfire. Researchers used a mixed-methods approach to triangulate results to identify potential views and motives surrounding three important behaviors and values related to crafting potential strategies to mitigate wildfire risk. The analysis of quantitative data in the form of responses to Likert-type questions and qualitative data in the form of responses to questions asked during focus group sessions yielded…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Repeated fall prescribed fire in previously thinned Pinus ponderosa increases growth and resistance to other disturbances
Year: 2021
In western North America beginning in the late 19th century, fire suppression and other factors resulted in denseponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa) forests that are now prone to high severity wildfire, insect attack, and rootdiseases. Thinning and prescribed fire are commonly used to remove small trees, fire-intolerant tree species, andshrubs, and to reduce surface and aerial fuels. These treatments can be effective at lowering future fire severity,but prescribed burns must be periodically repeated to maintain favorable conditions and are feasible only outsidethe historical summer wildfire…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Repeated fall prescribed fire in previously thinned Pinus ponderosa increases growth and resistance to other disturbances
Year: 2021
In western North America beginning in the late 19th century, fire suppression and other factors resulted in dense ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa) forests that are now prone to high severity wildfire, insect attack, and root diseases. Thinning and prescribed fire are commonly used to remove small trees, fire-intolerant tree species, and shrubs, and to reduce surface and aerial fuels. These treatments can be effective at lowering future fire severity, but prescribed burns must be periodically repeated to maintain favorable conditions and are feasible only outside the historical summer wildfire…
Publication Type: Journal Article
Contrasting the role of human- and lightning-caused wildfires on future fire regimes on a Central Oregon landscape
Year: 2021
Climate change is expected to increase fire activity in many regions of the globe, but the relative role of human vs. lightning-caused ignitions on future fire regimes is unclear. We developed statistical models that account for the spatiotemporal ignition patterns by cause in the eastern slopes of the Cascades in Oregon, USA. Projected changes in energy release component from a suite of climate models were used with our model to quantify changes in frequency and extent of human and lightning-caused fires and record-breaking events based on sizes of individual fires between contemporary (2006…
Publication Type: Journal Article
The importance of Indigenous cultural burning in forested regions of the Pacific West, USA
Year: 2021
Indigenous communities in the Pacific West of North America have long depended on fire to steward their environments, and they are increasingly asserting the importance of cultural burning to achieve goals for ecological and social restoration. We synthesized literature regarding objectives and effects of cultural burning in this region within an ecosystem services framework. Much scholarly literature focuses on why various species harvested from burned areas were important historically, while tribes and recent research increasingly stress a wide range of ecological and cultural benefits…
Publication Type: Journal Article