Journal Article

Prescribed fire is a useful tool for building resilient landscapes in fire-prone areas across the globe. In the western U.S., prescribed fire is employed by federal, state, and Tribal land managers and planned during particular meteorological and air quality conditions to manage air quality impacts.

Latino/a/x workers perform labor-intensive forestry and fire stewardship work in the U.S. Pacific Northwest, but are not well recognized in research and practice about wildfire governance.

Live fuel moisture content (LFMC) is a key determinant of landscape ignition potential, but quantitative estimates of its effects on wildfire are lacking. We present a causal inference framework to isolate the effect of LFMC from other drivers like fuel type, fuel amount, and meteorology.

Changes in wildfire frequency and severity are altering conifer forests and pose threats to biodiversity and natural climate solutions. Where and when feedbacks between vegetation and fire could mediate forest transformation are unresolved.

Dry conifer forests in the western US historically experienced frequent fire prior to European American colonization. Mean fire return interval ranged from about 5–35 years, with the majority of fires burning at low-to-moderate severity.

The influence of forest treatments on wildfire effects is challenging to interpret. This is, in part, because the impact forest treatments have on wildfire can be slight and variable across many factors. Effectiveness of a treatment also depends on the metric considered.

1. Fire is an inherently evolutionary process, even though much more emphasis has been given to ecological responses of plants and their associated communities to fire. 2.

In Washington, Oregon, and California, ignitions from recreational activities accounted for 12% of human-caused wildfires, and 8% of the area burned, from 1992–2020. Wildfires ignited by recreational activities not only increase fire suppression expenditures but have the potential to limit recreational activities traditionally associated with use of fire, such as camping.

High-severity wildfires create pulses of snags that serve a variety of functions as they decompose over time. Snag-related benefits (and hazards) are often linked to specific decomposition stages, but snag decomposition rates and pathways are not well understood in many forest types.

The escalating climate and wildfire crises have generated worldwide interest in using proactive forest management (e.g. forest thinning, prescribed fire, cultural burning) to mitigate the risk of wildfire-caused carbon loss in forests.