Fire Severity in Conifer Forests of the Sierra Nevada, California

Odion, Dennis C.; Hanson, Chad T.

doi:10.1007/s10021-003-0134-z

Cited by 55 publications

(48 citation statements)

References 36 publications

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“…Ten meters of sediment marked by faint and distinct laminations consisting of silty gyttja and interbedded inorganic turbidites were cored at a water depth of 14.1 m for charcoal, pollen, and other sedimentological analyses. To consider explicitly the short-term changes in the sedimentation rates of the last 2,000 y, we developed an agedepth model using a Bayesian-like approach that incorporates the magnetic susceptibility profile as a proxy of rapidly deposited minerogenic sediment (26,27), five accelerator mass spectrom-etry (AMS) 14 C dates on macrofossils, and a determination of the 137 Cs peak concentration ( Fig. 2 and Fig.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The belief that recent fires, such as the 196,000-ha Biscuit Fire in 2002, were more severe than the historical norm could be used to justify managing fire hazard through thinning or prescribed fire in currently dense stands (12,13). However, some have questioned whether increased fuels from fire suppression indeed pose an increased risk of severe fire (14,15) and whether climate may override fuel as a control of fire occurrence and extent (10,16).…”

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confidence: 99%

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Highly episodic fire and erosion regime over the past 2,000 y in the Siskiyou Mountains, Oregon

Colombaroli

Gavin

2010

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

120

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Fire is a primary mode of natural disturbance in the forests of the Pacific Northwest. Increased fuel loads following fire suppression and the occurrence of several large and severe fires have led to the perception that in many areas there is a greatly increased risk of high-severity fire compared with presettlement forests. To reconstruct the variability of the fire regime in the Siskiyou Mountains, Oregon, we analyzed a 10-m, 2,000-y sediment core for charcoal, pollen, and sedimentological data. The record reveals a highly episodic pattern of fire in which 77% of the 68 charcoal peaks before Euro-American settlement cluster within nine distinct periods marked by a 15-y mean interval. The 11 largest charcoal peaks are significantly related to decadal-scale drought periods and are followed by pulses of minerogenic sediment suggestive of rapid sediment delivery. After logging in the 1950s, sediment load was increased fourfold compared with that from the most severe presettlement fire. Less severe fires, marked by smaller charcoal peaks and no sediment pulses, are not correlated significantly with drought periods. Pollen indicators of closed forests are consistent with fire-free periods of sufficient length to maintain dense forest and indicate a fire-triggered switch to more open conditions during the Medieval Climatic Anomaly. Our results indicate that over millennia fire was more episodic than revealed by nearby shorter tree-ring records and that recent severe fires have precedents during earlier drought episodes but also that sediment loads resulting from logging and road building have no precedent in earlier fire events.historical fire | climate variability | ecological resilience | logging | sediment charcoal

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Highly episodic fire and erosion regime over the past 2,000 y in the Siskiyou Mountains, Oregon

Colombaroli

Gavin

2010

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

120

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“…In contrast, some researchers have recently suggested that large contemporary fires within the study area, which exhibited very large (1000-5000 ha) high-severity patches, fall within the natural range of variation, and therefore are typical of the historic fire regime (Odion and Hanson 2006). However, variation of fire regime characteristics is better described by traditional statistics (i.e., mean, mode and standard deviation) rather than maxima, because maxima by definition represent rare events (Burt and Barber 1996, Landres et al 1999, Sugihara and Barbour 2006.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 96%

Differences in wildfires among ecoregions and land management agencies in the Sierra Nevada region, California, USA

et al. 2012

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Abstract. Recent research has indicated that in most of the western United States, fire size is increasing, large fires are becoming more frequent, and in at least some locations percentage of high-severity fire is also increasing. These changes in the contemporary fire regime are largely attributed to both changing climate and land management practices, including suppression of fires and past timber harvesting, over the last century. Fire management, including suppression and using wildfire for resource benefits, varies among federal land management agencies, yet no published studies have directly compared fire statistics between federal land management agencies in our study area. The primary response to wildfire on Forest Service areas is immediate suppression, while the National Park Service is more likely to use wildfire for resource benefits. We use fire perimeters and satellite-derived estimates of fire severity to compare fire statistics for wildfires (fire size, percentage of high-severity fire and high-severity patch size) among ecoregions, forest types, and land management agencies 1984-2009 in the Sierra Nevada, Southern Cascades, and Modoc Plateau of California, USA. High-severity patch size and percentage of high-severity fire, regardless of forest type, were less (P , 0.05) in Yosemite National Park than on Forest Service lands. Yosemite fires were smaller on average than fires on Forest Service lands on the east side of the Sierra Nevada, southern Cascades and Modoc Plateau. Depending upon whether fires that crossed boundaries were included or not, mean size of Yosemite fires was either smaller or not significantly different from Forest Service fires on the west side of the Sierra Nevada. Even under current conditions, it appears that fire management practices that emulate those used in Yosemite could moderate effects of past land management, restoring and helping to maintain old forest conditions within the greater Sierra Nevada region, including the southern Cascades and Modoc Plateau.

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“…However, this is not assured by current policy [26]. Widely used methods for assessing the risk of high-severity fire may have limited accuracy [27]. Therefore, our analysis assumes random treatment location, as a first approximation.…”

Section: The Analytical Modelmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Higher-severity fire benefits watersheds and aquatic ecosystems in several ways, including providing a bonanza of recruitment of large wood and pulsed sediment supply that can rejuvenate aquatic habitats and increase their productivity [8,14]. High severity fire is also a key process for the restoration of structural heterogeneity in forests, which is important for biodiversity [27,40].…”

Section: Relaxing the Assumptions And Some Caveatsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fire Probability, Fuel Treatment Effectiveness and Ecological Tradeoffs in Western U.S. Public Forests

Rhodes¹,

Baker

2008

TOFSCIJ

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Fire Severity in Conifer Forests of the Sierra Nevada, California

Cited by 55 publications

References 36 publications

Highly episodic fire and erosion regime over the past 2,000 y in the Siskiyou Mountains, Oregon

Highly episodic fire and erosion regime over the past 2,000 y in the Siskiyou Mountains, Oregon

Differences in wildfires among ecoregions and land management agencies in the Sierra Nevada region, California, USA

Fire Probability, Fuel Treatment Effectiveness and Ecological Tradeoffs in Western U.S. Public Forests

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