Assessing crown fire potential in coniferous forests of western North America: a critique of current approaches and recent simulation studies

Cruz, Miguel G.; Alexander, Martin E.

doi:10.1071/wf08132

Cited by 188 publications

(158 citation statements)

References 95 publications

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“…Even an immediate doubling of fire rates due to climate change or other factors would result in far less habitat affected by highseverity fire than thinning. In addition, much of the highseverity fire might occur regardless of thinning, especially if the efficacy of thinning in reducing high-severity fire is reduced as fire becomes more controlled by climate and weather (Cruz and Alexander 2010). Clearly, the strategy of trying to maintain more dense, late-successional forest habitat by reducing fire does not work if the method for reducing fire adversely affects far more of this forest habitat than would high-severity fire, and the high-severity fire might occur anyway because it is largely controlled by climate and weather.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of Fire and Commercial Thinning on Future Habitat of the Northern Spotted Owl

Odion¹,

Hanson²,

DellaSala³

et al. 2014

TOORTHJ

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Abstract:The Northern Spotted Owl (Strix occidentalis caurina) is an emblematic, threatened raptor associated with dense, late-successional forests in the Pacific Northwest, USA. Concerns over high-severity fire and reduced timber harvesting have led to programs to commercially thin forests, and this may occur within habitat designated as "critical" for spotted owls. However, thinning is only allowed under the U.S. Government spotted owl guidelines if the long-term benefits clearly outweigh adverse impacts. This possibility remains uncertain. Adverse impacts from commercial thinning may be caused by removal of key habitat elements and creation of forests that are more open than those likely to be occupied by spotted owls. Benefits of thinning may accrue through reduction in high-severity fire, yet whether the firereduction benefits accrue faster than the adverse impacts of reduced late-successional habitat from thinning remains an untested hypothesis. We found that rotations of severe fire (the time required for high-severity fire to burn an area equal to the area of interest once) in spotted owl habitat since 1996, the earliest date we could use, were 362 and 913 years for the two regions of interest: the Klamath and dry Cascades. Using empirical data, we calculated the future amount of spotted owl habitat that may be maintained with these rates of high-severity fire and ongoing forest regrowth rates with and without commercial thinning. Over 40 years, habitat loss would be far greater than with no thinning because, under a "best case" scenario, thinning reduced 3.4 and 6.0 times more dense, late-successional forest than it prevented from burning in high-severity fire in the Klamath and dry Cascades, respectively. Even if rates of fire increase substantially, the requirement that the long-term benefits of commercial thinning clearly outweigh adverse impacts is not attainable with commercial thinning in spotted owl habitat. It is also becoming increasingly recognized that exclusion of high-severity fire may not benefit spotted owls in areas where owls evolved with reoccurring fires in the landscape.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of Fire and Commercial Thinning on Future Habitat of the Northern Spotted Owl

Odion¹,

Hanson²,

DellaSala³

et al. 2014

TOORTHJ

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“…If the canopy stratum is a patchy over-story, then the stand has poor horizontal fuel continuity in the canopy layer. Such stands readily support passive crowning (torching) and spotting under low relative humidity, especially when surface fuels are in an (Alexander 1998;Cruz and Alexander 2010;Finney 1998Finney , 1999Scott 1998;Scott and Reinhardt 2001;Van Wagner 1977. The availability of fuels varies not only in space, but also in time with changes in weather (principally relative humidity, temperature, and drought) (Bessie and Johnson 1995;Flannigan and Wotton 2001;Johnson 1992;Schroeder and Buck 1970).…”

Section: Fire Behavior and Effects: Concepts And Models _____________mentioning

confidence: 99%

Wildland fire in ecosystems: effects of fire on cultural resources and archaeology

Ryan¹,

Jones²,

Koerner³

et al. 2012

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This state-of-knowledge review provides a synthesis of the effects of fire on cultural resources, which can be used by fire managers, cultural resource (CR) specialists, and archaeologists to more effectively manage wildland vegetation, fuels, and fire. The goal of the volume is twofold: (1) to provide cultural resource/archaeological professionals and policy makers with a primer on fuels, fire behavior, and fire effects to enable them to work more effectively with the fire management community to protect resources during fuels treatment and restoration projects and wildfire suppression activities; and (2) to provide fire and land management professionals and policy makers with a greater understanding of the value of cultural resource protection and the methods available to evaluate and mitigate risks to CR. The synthesis provides a conceptual fire effects framework for planning, managing, and modeling fire effects (chapter1) and a primer on fire and fuel processes and fire effects prediction modeling (chapter 2). A synthesis of the effects of fire on various cultural resource materials is provided for ceramics (chapter 3), lithics (chapter 4), rock art (chapter 5), historic-period artifacts/materials (chapter 6), and below-ground features (chapter 7). Chapter 8 discusses the importance of cultural landscapes to indigenous peoples and emphasizes the need to actively involve native people in the development of collaborative management plans. The use and practical implications of this synthesis are the subject of the final chapter (chapter 9).Keywords: cultural resources, heritage resources, archaeology, fire regime, fire environment, fuels management, fire management, fire planning, wildfire, prescribed fire, First-Order fire effects, Second-Order fire effects, Third-Order fire effects, Burned Area Emergency Rehabilitation (BAER), fire severity, traditional cultural knowledge (TKE), cultural landscapesTo order, check any box or boxes below, fill in the address form, and send to the mailing address listed below. Or send your order and your address in mailing label form to one of the other listed media.RMRS-GTR-42-vol. 1. Wildland fire in ecosystems: effects of fire on fauna. Send to: ________________________________________________________________________________ Name RMRS-GTR ________________________________________________________________________________ AddressYou may order additional copies of this publication by sending your mailing information in label form through one of the following media. Please specify the publication title and number. Publishing ServicesTelephone ( Summary ____________________________________Cultural resources refer to the physical evidence of human occupations that cultural resource specialists and archaeologists use to reconstruct the past. This includes the objects, locations, and landscapes that play a significant role in the history or cultural traditions of a group of people. Cultural resources include artifacts of historical significance left by prehistoric aboriginal p...

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“…Many important factors that affect crown fire are not included (Werth et al 2011). It is especially important for a user to be aware of model limitations in predicting extreme fire behaviour (Cruz and Alexander 2010).…”

Section: Crown Firementioning

confidence: 99%

Current status and future needs of the BehavePlus Fire Modeling System

Andrews¹

2014

Int. J. Wildland Fire

165

100

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Abstract. The BehavePlus Fire Modeling System is among the most widely used systems for wildland fire prediction. It is designed for use in a range of tasks including wildfire behaviour prediction, prescribed fire planning, fire investigation, fuel hazard assessment, fire model understanding, communication and research. BehavePlus is based on mathematical models for fire behaviour, fire effects and fire environment. It is a point system for which conditions are constant for each calculation, but is designed to encourage examination of the effect of a range of conditions through tables and graphs. BehavePlus is successor to BEHAVE, which was developed in 1977 and became available for field application in 1984. It was updated to BehavePlus in 2002. Updates through version 5 have added features and modelling capabilities. It is becoming increasingly difficult to expand the system. A redesign will address the need for consolidation with other systems and make it easier to incorporate new research results. This paper describes the development history and application of BehavePlus. The design, features and modelling foundation of the current system are described. Considerations for the next generation are presented.

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Assessing crown fire potential in coniferous forests of western North America: a critique of current approaches and recent simulation studies

Cited by 188 publications

References 95 publications

Effects of Fire and Commercial Thinning on Future Habitat of the Northern Spotted Owl

Effects of Fire and Commercial Thinning on Future Habitat of the Northern Spotted Owl

Wildland fire in ecosystems: effects of fire on cultural resources and archaeology

Current status and future needs of the BehavePlus Fire Modeling System

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