Severity of an uncharacteristically large wildfire, the Rim Fire, in forests with relatively restored frequent fire regimes

Forest Ecology and Management

Volumn 328, Issue , 2014, Pages 326-334

  Lydersen, Jamie M ^a   North, Malcolm P ^a,b   Collins, Brandon M ^a,c  

^a PACIFIC SOUTHWEST RESEARCH STATION   (United States)

^b UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA   (United States)

^c UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA   (United States)

Author keywords

Fire severity; Forest resilience; Frequent fire regime; Interacting fires; Mixed conifer forest; Rim fire

Indexed keywords

DECISION TREES; FORESTRY; FUELS; METEOROLOGY; RESTORATION;

EXTREME WEATHER CONDITIONS; FIRE REGIMES; FIRE SEVERITY; FOREST RESILIENCE; HIGH-SEVERITY FIRES; MIXED-CONIFER FORESTS; OLD-GROWTH FOREST; YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK;

FIRES;

CLIMATE CONDITIONS; DATA SET; FOREST ECOSYSTEM; INDEX METHOD; OLD-GROWTH FOREST; RESTORATION ECOLOGY; TOPOGRAPHY; VEGETATION COVER; WILDFIRE;

DECISION MAKING; FOREST FIRES; FUELS; METEOROLOGY; RESTORATION;

CALIFORNIA; UNITED STATES; YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK;

EID: 84903648247     PISSN: 03781127     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1016/j.foreco.2014.06.005     Document Type: Article

References (55)

1. Brown, J.K., 1974. Handbook for inventorying downed woody material. General Technical Report INT-16, USDA Forest Service, Intermountain Forest and Range Experiment Station, Ogden, Utah, 24.
2. Collins B.M. Fire weather and large fire potential in the northern Sierra Nevada. Agric. Forest Meteorology 2014, 189-190:30-35.
3. Collins B.M., Everett R.G., Stephens S.L. Impacts of fire exclusion and recent managed fire on forest structure in old growth Sierra Nevada mixed-conifer forests. Ecosphere 2011, 2. art51.
4. Collins B.M., Kelly M., van Wagtendonk J.W., Stephens S.L. Spatial patterns of large natural fires in Sierra Nevada wilderness areas. Landscape Ecol. 2007, 22:545-557.
5. Collins B.M., Miller J.D., Thode A.E., Kelly M., van Wagtendonk J.W., Stephens S.L. Interactions among wildland fires in a long-established Sierra Nevada natural fire area. Ecosystems 2009, 12:114-128.
6. Collins B.M., Roller G.B. Early forest dynamics in stand-replacing fire patches in the northern Sierra Nevada, California, USA. Landscape Ecology 2013, 1-13.
7. Collins B.M., Stephens S.L. Managing natural wildfires in Sierra Nevada wilderness areas. Front. Ecol. Environ. 2007, 5:523-527.
8. Dennison P.E., Brewer S.C., Arnold J.D., Moritz M.A. Large wildfire trends in the western United States, 1984-2011. Geophys. Res. Lett. 2014, 41. 2014GL059576.
9. Finney, M.A., Bartlette, R., Bradshaw, L., Close, K., Collins, B.M., Gleason, P., Hao, W.M., Langowski, P., McGinely, J., McHugh, C.W., Martinson, E.J., Omi, P.N., Shepperd, W.D., Zeller, K., 2003. Fire behavior, fuel treatments, and fire suppression on the Hayman Fire. In: Graham, R.T. (Ed.), Hayman Fire Case Study. General Technical Report RMRS-GTR-114, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Ogden, UT, 33-180.
10. Fowler C.T. Human health impacts of forest fires in the southern United States: a literature review. J. Ecological Anthropology 2003, 7:39-63.
11. Holden Z., Morgan P., Hudak A. Burn severity of areas reburned by wildfires in the Gila National Forest, New Mexico, USA. Fire Ecology 2010, 6:77-85.
12. Hothorn T., Hornik K., Zeileis A. Unbiased recursive partitioning: a conditional inference framework. J. Comput. Graph. Stat. 2006, 15:651-674.
13. Hurlbert S.H. Pseudoreplication and the design of ecological field experiments. Ecol. Monogr. 1984, 54:187-211.
14. Janitza S., Strobl C., Boulesteix A.-L. An AUC-based permutation variable importance measure for random forests. BMC Bioinformatics 2013, 14:119.
15. Kapnick S., Hall A. Observed climate-snowpack relationships in California and their Implications for the future. J. Clim. 2010, 23:3446-3456.
16. Key, C.H., Benson, N.C., 2006. Landscape assessment (LA). In: Lutes, D.C., Keane, R.E., Caratti, J.F., Key, C.H., Benson, N.C., Sutherland, S., Gangi, L.J. (Eds.), FIREMON: Fire effects monitoring and inventory system. General Technical Report RMRS-GTR-164-CD, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Fort Collins, CO, LA-1-55.
17. Larson A.J., Belote R.T., Cansler C.A., Parks S.A., Dietz M.S. Latent resilience in ponderosa pine forest: effects of resumed frequent fire. Ecol. Appl. 2013, 23:1243-1249.
18. Larson A.J., Churchill D. Tree spatial patterns in fire-frequent forests of western North America, including mechanisms of pattern formation and implications for designing fuel reduction and restoration treatments. For. Ecol. Manage. 2012, 267:74-92.
19. Lentile L.B., Smith F.W., Shepperd W.D. Influence of topography and forest structure on patterns of mixed severity fire in ponderosa pine forests of the South Dakota Black Hills, USA. Int. J. Wildland Fire 2006, 15:557-566.
20. Liu Y., Goodrick S., Heilman W. Wildland fire emissions, carbon, and climate: wildfire-climate interactions. For. Ecol. Manage. 2014, 317:80-96.
21. Lutz J.A., van Wagtendonk J.W., Thode A.E., Miller J.D., Franklin J.F. Climate, lightning ignitions, and fire severity in Yosemite National Park, California, USA. Int. J. Wildland Fire 2009, 18:765-774.
22. Lydersen J., North M. Topographic variation in structure of mixed-conifer forests under an active-fire regime. Ecosystems 2012, 15:1134-1146.
23. Lydersen J.M., North M.P., Knapp E.E., Collins B.M. Quantifying spatial patterns of tree groups and gaps in mixed-conifer forests: reference conditions and long-term changes following fire suppression and logging. For. Ecol. Manage. 2013, 304:370-382.
24. Mallek C., Safford H., Viers J., Miller J. Modern departures in fire severity and area vary by forest type, Sierra Nevada and southern Cascades, California, USA. Ecosphere 2013, 4. art153.
25. Marlon J.R., Bartlein P.J., Gavin D.G., Long C.J., Anderson R.S., Briles C.E., Brown K.J., Colombaroli D., Hallett D.J., Power M.J., Scharf E.A., Walsh M.K. Long-term perspective on wildfires in the western USA. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 2012, 109:E535-E543.
26. Miller J.D., Knapp E.E., Key C.H., Skinner C.N., Isbell C.J., Creasy R.M., Sherlock J.W. Calibration and validation of the relative differenced Normalized Burn Ratio (RdNBR) to three measures of fire severity in the Sierra Nevada and Klamath Mountains, California, USA. Remote Sens. Environ. 2009, 113:645-656.
27. Miller J.D., Skinner C.N., Safford H.D., Knapp E.E., Ramirez C.M. Trends and causes of severity, size, and number of fires in northwestern California, USA. Ecol. Appl. 2012, 22:184-203.
28. Miller J.D., Thode A.E. Quantifying burn severity in a heterogeneous landscape with a relative version of the delta Normalized Burn Ratio (dNBR). Remote Sens. Environ. 2007, 109:66-80.
29. Muhle J., Lueker T.J., Su Y., Miller B.R., Prather K.A., Weiss R.F. Trace gas and particulate emissions from the 2003 southern California wildfires. J. Geophys. Res.-Atmos. 2007, 112:D03307.
30. NIFC, 2013. National Interagency Fire Center, Suppression Costs 1985-2013. Last (accessed 18.03.14). http://www.nifc.gov/fireInfo/fireInfo_documents/SuppCosts.pdf.
31. North, M.P., 2012. Managing Sierra Nevada forests. General Technical Report PSW-GTR-237, USDA Forest Service, Pacific Southwest Research Station, Albany, CA, 184 p.
32. North M.P., Stine P., O'Hara K.L., Stephens S. Harnessing fire for wildlife. Wildlife Professional 2010, 4:30-33.
33. Parker A.J. The topographic relative moisture index: an approach to soil-moisture assessment in mountain terrain. Phys. Geogr. 1982, 3:160-168.
34. Parks S.A., Miller C., Nelson C.R., Holden Z.A. Previous fires moderate burn severity of subsequent wildland fires in two large western US wilderness areas. Ecosystems 2013, 17:29-42.
35. Parks S.A., Parisien M.-A., Miller C. Multi-scale evaluation of the environmental controls on burn probability in a southern Sierra Nevada landscape. Int. J. Wildland Fire 2011, 20:815-828.
36. Parsons D.J., Debenedetti S.H. Impact of fire suppression on a mixed-conifer forest. For. Ecol. Manage. 1979, 2:21-33.
37. Rothermel, R.C., 1991. Predicting behavior and size of crown fires in the Northern Rocky Mountains. Research Paper INT-438, USDA Forest Service, Intermountain Research Station, Ogden, UT, 46 p.
38. Scholl A.E., Taylor A.H. Fire regimes, forest change, and self-organization in an old-growth mixed-conifer forest, Yosemite National Park, USA. Ecol. Appl. 2010, 20:362-380.
39. Skinner, C.N., Chang, C., 1996. Fire Regimes, past and present. Sierra Nevada ecosystem project: final report to congress. Vol. II. Assessments and scientific basis for management options. Centers for Water and Wildland Resources, University of California, Davis, pp. 1041-1069.
40. Skinner C.N., Taylor A.H. Southern cascades bioregion. Fire in California's Ecosystems 2006, 195-224. University of California Press, Berkeley. N.G. Sugihara, J.W. VanWagtendonk, J. Fites-Kaufman, K.E. Shaffer, A.E. Thode (Eds.).
41. Stephens S.L., Burrows N., Buyantuyev A., Gray R.W., Keane R.E., Kubian R., Liu S.R., Seijo F., Shu L.F., Tolhurst K.G., van Wagtendonk J.W. Temperate and boreal forest mega-fires: characteristics and challenges. Front. Ecol. Environ. 2014, 12:115-122.
42. Stephens S.L., Fry D.L., Franco-Vizcaino E. Wildfire and spatial patterns in forests in northwestern Mexico: the United States wishes it had similar fire problems. Ecol. Soc. 2008, 13:1-12.
43. Stephens S.L., Fule P.Z. Western pine forests with continuing frequent fire regimes: possible reference sites for management. J. For. 2005, 103:357-362.
44. Stephens S.L., Ruth L.W. Federal forest-fire policy in the United States. Ecol. Appl. 2005, 15:532-542.
45. Strobl C., Boulesteix A.-L., Kneib T., Augustin T., Zeileis A. Conditional variable importance for random forests. BMC Bioinformatics 2008, 9:307.
46. Strobl C., Boulesteix A.-L., Zeileis A., Hothorn T. Bias in random forest variable importance measures: illustrations, sources and a solution. BMC Bioinformatics 2007, 8:25.
47. Strobl C., Malley J., Tutz G. An introduction to recursive partitioning: rationale, application, and characteristics of classification and regression trees, bagging, and random forests. Psychol. Methods 2009, 14:323-348.
48. Taylor A.H. Fire disturbance and forest structure in an old-growth Pinus ponderosa forest, southern Cascades, USA. J. Veg. Sci. 2010, 21:561-572.
49. Thompson J.R., Spies T.A. Factors associated with crown damage following recurring mixed-severity wildfires and post-fire management in southwestern Oregon. Landscape Ecol. 2010, 25:775-789.
50. van Mantgem P.J., Schwilk D.W. Negligible influence of spatial autocorrelation in the assessment of fire effects in a mixed conifer forest. Fire Ecology 2009, 5:116-125.
51. van Wagtendonk J.W. The history and evolution of wildland fire use. Fire Ecology 2007, 3:3-17.
52. Van Wagtendonk J.W., Van Wagtendonk K.A., Thode A.E. Factors associated with the severity of intersecting fires in Yosemite National Park, California, USA. J. Assoc. Fire Ecology 2012, 8:11-31.
53. Webster K.M., Halpern C.B. Long-term vegetation responses to reintroduction and repeated use of fire in mixed-conifer forests of the Sierra Nevada. Ecosphere 2010, 1. art9.
54. Werth, P.A., Potter, B.E., Clements, C.B., Finney, M.A., Goodrick, S.L., Alexander, M.E., Cruz, M.G., Forthofer, J.A., McAllister, S.S., 2011. Synthesis of knowledge of extreme fire behavior: for fire managers. General Technical Report PNW-GTR-854, US Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station, Vol. I. Portland, OR, 144.
55. Westerling A.L., Hidalgo H.G., Cayan D.R., Swetnam T.W. Warming and earlier spring increase western US forest wildfire activity. Science 2006, 313:940-943.