The California Fire Science Seminar Series is one of my favorites. There’s also a Q&A afterwards with the presenter
Here’s a link to Kevin Bladon’s presentation from a few weeks ago. I thought the whole thing was interesting.
About 30 minutes in, there’s a discussion of some research on salvage logging and water quality/quantity and soils, with different studies finding different things. During the Q&A, I asked Bladon whether he had any ideas based on his experience in the field, of preferred salvage practices. He did and I encouraged him to publish some kind of “helpful summary for practitioners.” We (various folks on the Zoom) had a discussion as to whether if such a paper were produced by him through OSU Extension, would it make it to NEPA people and sale planners in the Forest Service? I wasn’t sure, so anyone who has an opinion, please chime in.
For NEPA people/sale planners, a peer-reviewed publication is preferred. They need to be using the “best available science”, and a peer-reviewed journal article is viewed as an indicator of that. Extension publications tend to have a different audience – in my experience it is usually family forests or small private forest landowners, not large landowners or federal land management agencies. In this case, a fire consortium (the PNW Fire Science Consortium?) producing a “research brief” based on a single or several peer-reviewed articles would be helpful. The Fire Science Consortia are more focused on federal land management agencies and large landowners and on application of current science.
Targeted literature/guidance is currently in the works. This will include a GTR, as well other material for private/industrial landowners.