Tree traits influence response to fire severity: Johnson et al. paper 2019

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Fig. 2. Examples of severity classes sampled. Panel A=high severity, Panel B=moderate severity, Panel C=low severity. All photos were taken in 2018 within the Warner Creek fire perimeter, 27 years post-fire.

 

I thought this paper was interesting because the authors directly measured trees, and took photos of the studied stands, which really gives a reader a feel for the study.  Here’s  a link to the paper itself, and here as described in ScienceDirect.

Highlights

•Large trees and shade intolerant trees had a higher probability of surviving fire.
•Radial growth in small trees in burned stands increased.
•Radial growth in large trees remained suppressed for decades after fire.
•Radial growth responses can be explained by changes in leaf area.
•Smaller trees easily add leaf area following fire while larger trees often do not.

These all make sense, in my experience.  We used to have the concept of “release” in silviculture. The idea is that if you remove competing trees, sometimes the released tree will grow and thrive, and sometimes it will just sit there or “not release.”  It sounds like the large trees may have been old, and some old trees don’t release.  Trees don’t release for a variety of reasons, depending on species, age and other factors which  silviculturists and silviculture researchers have spent a great deal of time thinking about. Maybe someone can weigh in who knows the studied area, species, etc.?

I think one of points that the authors are making is that one fire severity index measurement can’t really explain what you need to know about trees. If you want to know about stands of trees post-fire, you should measure stands of trees post-fire.

The results we present suggest that fire severity alters forest stand structure not only through mortality but also via individual tree physiological responses. Slower growth in residual trees that results from fire damage may render these trees more vulnerable to mortality in the face of additional stressors (Cailleret et al., 2016; van Mantgem et al., 2003).

We believe it is most likely that fire has a more pronounced longterm effect on radial growth of tall-statured and large diameter trees than smaller trees because recovery of a tree’s leaf area following disturbance is achieved primarily through height growth and the addition of new branches. Large trees at or near their maximum height potential have limited capacity to recover in this fashion, instead relying on the creation of epicormic branches and more complex crown structures to add leaf area without exceeding the tensile strength of the water columns (Van Pelt and Sillett, 2008; Ishii and Ford, 2001; Waring et al.,1982). This has important implications for wildlife species reliant on complex crown or branch structure for nesting, such as northern spotted owl or marbled murrelet (Bond et al., 2009; Ritchie, 1988; Franklin et al., 1981). Fire disturbance may be an important mechanism for creating these features and the persistence of these species in the Pacific Northwest (Fig. 9)

Although we show that MTBS severity classifications are associated with distinctive tree-scale effects, the differential response to fire of trees of different sizes and species suggests that it is important to contextualize field measured or satellite-derived severity metrics by forest structural and compositional attributes. The same fire severity as measured by standard indexes may have different implications for
future forest dynamics depending on residual tree structure and composition. Fire intensity and individual tree resistance drive residual tree structure and composition following fire. As we continue to develop heuristics and management strategies based on fire severity maps, it becomes increasingly important that we find ways to quantify pre-fire forest structure to better understand the future trajectory of forests following disturbance.

 

Partnership Aims to Protect Water Supplies

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The article from Sacramento TV station KCRA is about the French Meadows project on the Tahoe National Forest. I think we’ll see many more such collaborative projects aimed at protecting water supplies.

Work is scheduled to begin this week on a first-of-its-kind partnership to reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfire around essential drinking water supplies stored in the Sierra.

“This is the first time Greenhouse Gas Reduction Funds from the state’s carbon tax are being put back into a watershed to reduce emissions from catastrophic wildfire,” said Andrew Fecko of the Placer County Water Agency.

The partnership includes a unique collaboration between public agencies including, the U.S. Forest Service, Placer County Water Agency, the County of Placer, community organizations like The Nature Conservancy and private business, including Coca-Cola and Anheuser Busch.

…

Researchers from UC Merced are providing information about optimal forest densities for current and future climate conditions.

The Nature Conservancy is also leading research to monitor the impact of forest thinning on future fire behavior.

The decision notice and FONSI states that the project involves “a variety of forest restoration treatments, including mechanical thinning, mastication, hand thinning, reforestation, and use of prescribed fire, will be conducted on a total of approximately 12,183 acres in specific locations. Treatments are designed to reduce potential wildfire intensity and severity, reduce accumulation of surface and ladder fuels, improve forest health and resiliency, and enhance structure and function of forested lands across a broad landscape on National Forest System lands in the French Meadows Project area.”

Yes, commercial harvesting is one element of the plan: 8.4 MMBF of sawlogs and 7,000 bone-dry tons of biomass, and all live conifers 30 inches dbh and larger would be retained.

 

Does Legalization Lead to More Illegal Grows on National Forests?

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Colorado is an interesting place to examine the phenomenon of “good industry/bad industry.” We watchers from the sidelines can ask questions like “who gets to pick which are good industries and bad industries?” “to what extent have political parties aligned with certain industries and not others?” and, of course, “why is regulation and scrutiny good for some and not for others?”. If we were all reasonable, would there be a reasonable level of regulation for each?

In Colorado, we have a unique opportunity to observe this, more or less in our face, as in the last session our elected officials determined that some industries need to be more highly regulated, and others less so.

Nationally, some thought it was OK to get a CEO of one (good) industry (recreation) to be Secretary of the Interior. But it was not OK to get lobbyists who have worked for other (bad) industries for the same post (e.g. Pruitt, Bernhardt).  My interest here is fairness in that industries are held to the same kinds of protections to public health and safety and to the environment, or that we should have transparent, public reasons why we think that they should be treated differently.

What is interesting to me is the idea that some industries (oil and gas) and not others (e.g., marijuana, ski areas) are to be held to the standard of “requires the commission to protect and minimize adverse impacts to public health, safety, and welfare, the environment, and wildlife resources and protect against adverse environmental impacts on any air, water, soil, or biological resource resulting from …. operations. This was part of state legislation on oil and gas, but seems to me that it could be applicable to any industry.

According to this recent Colorado Springs Gazette editorial, some industries can have overseers that are proponents.  They state

“Ean Seeb, the state’s new Special Adviser on Cannabis, comes straight from the pot industry. A Polis advocate during the campaign, Seeb is a longtime advocate of delivering pot like pizza, deregulating investments into Big Marijuana and allowing on-site cannabis tasking rooms.
…

Seeb is two-time chair of the National Cannabis Industry Association, which advocates for more pot sales. Seeb will serve as a walking conflict of interest. It’s like the Marlboro Man monitoring cigarette sales.”

Although it is not widely covered in the media, there are environmental impacts to growing marijuana (energy, pesticides),  safety impacts, and economic impacts.

For our purposes at The Smokey Wire, though, what is of interest is:

Dave Condit, deputy forest and grassland supervisor for the Pike-San Isabel Forest and Cimarron-Comanche National Grasslands, told The Gazette last year his jurisdiction’s entire budget could not cover the costs of removing foreign drug cartels invading the public lands he oversees.

We talked about this here last year when it first came out, but I’m curious as to whether this has been observed in any other state besides Colorado? I tried to get the numbers, but was told I would have to FOIA them. While I’m FOIAing, I could certainly do it nation-wide. Is anyone else interested in this topic?

Pine beetles and fires are gutting B.C.’s forestry sector

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It’s more than lumber markets and trade. Article in Canada’s Financial Post yesterday:

Trouble in timberland: How pine beetles and fires are gutting B.C.’s forestry sector

Deep in the tree-studded interior of British Columbia, the tiny town of Clearwater is facing a problem that’s sweeping across the province: Surrounded by nothing but trees, somehow, there isn’t enough timber to support a local sawmill.

This summer, for the first time in decades, the town of around 2,000 people — about a five-hour drive northeast of Vancouver — won’t have a mill to anchor its local economy, as Canfor Corp. plans to mothball its nearby Vavenby operation in July.

It’s a situation that’s been years in the making, as the ravenous mountain pine beetle population exploded thanks to warmer winters, which in combination with record fires, destroyed huge swaths of forests. Now, there are too many mills in B.C. and not enough supply to feed them all.

Also, “A new bill by the B.C. government has added to the industry’s woes.”

“…in May, after B.C. legislators passed Bill 22, which creates a new obligation for companies to demonstrate a “public interest” before they can sell or transfer their licenses to harvest timber from provincial land in a specific geographic area.”

 

 

 

Public Land Advocates: Forest Service Must Reopen Public Trails in Montana’s Crazy Mountains

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Below is part of a press release from Enhancing Montana’s Wildlife & Habitat and others concerning an issue that’s been getting lots of attention in Montana.

HELENA, Mont. – A coalition of conservation-based groups filed a lawsuit on June 10 against the U.S. Forest Service to maintain traditional public access opportunities in the Crazy Mountains of Montana.

The groups’ challenge hinges on the Forest Service’s continued lack of progress and unresponsiveness in maintaining the public’s right to access public lands and waters in the Crazy Mountains. In February, the coalition submitted a letter to the Forest Service summarizing concerns over public access in the Crazies and notifying the agency of its intent to sue should access issues fail to be resolved.

“The upper levels of the Forest Service chose not to respond or address our local public access concerns and repeated complaints of obstruction,” said Brad Wilson of Friends of the Crazy Mountains, a retired Park County assistant road supervisor and deputy sheriff. “Due to the Forest Service’s negligence, we had no choice but to appeal to the court.”

The coalition contends that the public, has longstanding and permanent public access to Montana’s Crazy Mountains. The lawsuit charges that until recently the Forest Service supported and maintained the public’s access to the trails, but certain Forest Service leaders now are abdicating their duty to protect and preserve public access there. The suit specifies four trails, two on the west side and two on the east side of the mountain range, that are mapped as public trails, are well known and have been traditionally used by the public but where certain landowners now are illegally and impermissibly attempting to deny public access (Porcupine Lowline #267, Elk Creek #195, East Trunk #115/136 and Sweet Grass #122).

“Hearing about attempts to obstruct public access in the Crazy Mountains, I began over 1,100 hours of documentation, FOIA requests to the Forest Service, and historical research that verified these trails are public,” said Kathryn QannaYahu of EMWH. “Especially compelling were the county railroad grant deeds of private land, containing the words ‘easement in the public.’ What I found angered me, because the public has easement interests on these four trails, which the Service isn’t protecting on our behalf. On the contrary, they’re allowing certain landowners to attempt to obstruct public access and undermine my and the public’s ability to access historic trials in the Crazy Mountains.”

In a response to Sen. Steve Daines dated Oct. 2, 2015, Forest Supervisor Mary Erickson wrote, “The Forest Service maintains that it holds unperfected prescriptive rights on this trail system, as well as up Sweet Grass Creek to the north based on a history of maintenance with public funds and historic and continued public and administrative use.”

“The Forest Service is bound to do its job and maintain access to these trails,” said Matthew Bishop of the Western Environmental Law Center. “It’s just that simple. This means managing and maintaining the trails, replacing and reinstalling national forest trail markers and signs, and ensuring public access on our public trails in the Crazy Mountains.”

In the words of the Forest Service’s own attorneys regarding one of these trails: “Indeed, it would be irresponsible of the Forest Service to simply abandon these easement rights or fail to reflect their existence in the travel plan simply to avoid the souring of relationships between landowners and recreational groups.”

Photos and maps of the trails are available here.

Crazy Mountains Public Access FAQs

Increasing Wind and Solar on Public Lands: Outside Magazine Article

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I first heard about this idea from something on Jared Polis’s (Colorado’s now-governor) website. The fundamental idea is that public lands should not be used for oil and gas production, but should be used for more wind and solar production.

It is conceivable that different uses could co-exist on public lands (at least wind, and oil and gas, and grazing) as they do on private lands in Kansas and Colorado (and no doubt elsewhere). But the case being made seems to be that one group should be removed from public lands (oil and gas) and another group increased (solar and wind). It seems that it is framed as “either/or” and not “both/and.” And yet, oil and gas production has some commonalities with solar and wind.

First, solar and wind also have environmental impacts. Second, they can also be unaesthetic, and thereby potentially incompatible with recreation. Third, they tend to impact a greater surface area of land (than oil and gas), and fourth, they may require transmission lines instead of roads. I don’t know the relative impacts, but I do know that many environmental groups don’t seem to like new roads or transmission lines on public lands. fourth, solar and wind generate electricity which can’t substitute for fuel currently used in heating and transportation immediately, so there would be a transition during which fossil fuels will come from elsewhere. For me, these are all considerations.

BLM has much information on their solar and wind programs, solar and wind.

What’s interesting about this Outside story is that it takes for granted the idea that carbon is emitted by production on federal lands, and that stopping it will simply reduce carbon emissions. If we import oil and gas from other countries and use the same amount, it is difficult for me to see that that makes a positive difference to the environment (while making a negative difference to state coffers). If importing increases prices and decreases energy security, then it might not be a good thing at all for folks who depend on oil and gas products for heating and transportation, and are on the poor end of the financial spectrum.

Here’s the link to the Outside story.

Federal lands hold tremendous untapped potential for unleashing a renewables boom and sucking down the carbon dioxide that’s warming the globe, Huntley and other energy-policy experts say. While federal lands hold significant oil, gas, and coal reserves, they also have some of the nation’s best solar and wind resources. Yet TWS estimates that less than 5 percent of U.S. power from renewables is generated on federal land. The BLM alone manages more than 20 million acres with wind-energy potential in the 11 western states. Largely because of renewable-energy pushes from previous administrations, the BLM has approved about 11,000 megawatts worth of solar, wind, and geothermal projects.

But with some significant exceptions, such as the Ivanpah megasolar facility on BLM lands in California, which went online in 2014 and now powers 140,000 homes around the West, the renewable potential of the vast open landscapes of the federal estate is underdeveloped. And if oil and gas development is phased out under a Green New Deal bill—or any other legislation that tamps down greenhouse-gas emissions—renewables development on federal lands will be crucial to replace that energy.

Renewable-energy development is not without its own environmental consequences, though. The massive Ivanpah solar-thermal project, for example—at the time the largest solar facility in the world—disturbed habitat for the desert tortoise, blue-gray gnatcatcher, and other wildlife and forever changed the scenery in the Mojave Desert. Bird and bat deaths from encounters with wind turbines are well-documented. But conservation groups say that much has been learned from Ivanpah and other renewable-development projects about how to plan, develop, and monitor them in a way that reduces their impacts. Measures adopted through legislation could ensure that new projects avoid the mistakes of the past, they say.

It’s also interesting that conservation groups think that the renewable energy industry can reduce their impacts through improved monitoring and so on. I am curious as to why some industries seem to get the benefit of the doubt with regard to the environment and public lands (solar, wind) but others do not (timber, grazing, oil and gas).

Oh, and forests are mentioned in the article as well.

Keene and DellaSala on Shotcash Timber Sale

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Op-ed in the Eugene Register-Guard. Several points are worthy of discussion, such as this one:

“The BLM Shotcash timber sale violates the spirit of the 1937 O&C Sustained Yield Act….”

The spirit of the O&C Act was — and still is — sustained yield. That is, the sustained yield. BLM isn’t coming close to that level of harvest. Some would say that is a violation of the spirit of the act.

Chainsaws in Wilderness on the San Juan- The Ferebee Letter and Two Questions

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Many thanks to Anonymous for finding this informative piece on the issue in the Durango Herald. It did raise some questions in my mind, though, perhaps worthy of discussion here.

First, as I pointed out in a previous comment, there is too much snow to imagine that the FS would be doing this for a very long time period this summer. Here is the Ferebee letter:

As indicated in my May 31 letter, snowpack conditions in these two wilderness areas are highly unusual for this time of year, ranging from 500% to more than 700% of normal as of May 30. Reports by trail crews and scouts over the past week indicate that access into the backcountry to perform trail maintenance work will need to be delayed even further than initially forecasted. Avalanches have blocked many trails and those trails are unlikely to be accessible until late in the year. Given these unexpected and extraordinary conditions, it is unlikely that we could access our wilderness trails to begin work by July 8, and therefore it is also unlikely that we would realize any substantial benefit from the use of chainsaws to clear trail obstructions during the period authorized by my May 31 letter.

Avalanches and heavy snowpack have created changed conditions. We expect significant resource damage to have occurred, more so than what was anticipated from the time of my original and amended decisions, which now must be further addressed. Therefore, we will reassess the overall needs, considering these changed conditions, as related to wilderness and non-wilderness trail impacts. I am rescinding the approval to use chainsaws that was conveyed in my May 7 letter, as amended by my May 31 letter, until our assessed needs are completed.

It is expected that trail clearing with non-motorized equipment and trail reconnaissance will proceed to the extent feasible, with priority being given to safety, and reduction of the potential for resource damage and impairment of wilderness values. Some elements of my May 7 decision will proceed as planned. Specifically:

1. Identify and maintain a record of trail segments encountered during maintenance activities that meet the “jackstraw” standard of 40 or more downed or leaning trees per mile obstructing the trail route, particularly those that are not able to be cleared with non­ motorized equipment this year.
2. Study and report on the efficiency of using non-motorized saws to clear trails in the wilderness; and
3. Study and report on the efficiency of using chainsaws to clear trails outside of wilderness, and how those efficiencies would be affected by lack of proximity to motor vehicle travel routes that are typical in wilderness.

In addition, publicity surrounding this proposal has elicited interest from several new sources in providing volunteer and other labor to perform trail clearing with non-motorized equipment.
Both Forests should fully explore these offers to determine if they may in fact provide viable sources of skilled labor that would reduce the need to perform trail maintenance with chainsaws in the future.

My first question was surprise that there are people out there willing to volunteer to do trail maintenance, who have only offered since they heard about the possibility of chainsaws in Wilderness. It would be interesting to know who these folks are, so that forests might find out how they could be missing potential sources of volunteers.

Second is that the article in the Durango Herald quotes:

While the number of downed trees seems daunting, former trail crew members have told Pearson there is not much of an advantage to using chain saws because the heavy saws and gas must be packed into the wilderness to clear trails, Pearson said.

“It’s not really demonstrably needed to get the job done,” he said of using chain saws.

I have never cleared trails in Wilderness, but I have spoken to people who clear trails who think that they can get more done with chainsaws. I wonder why people disagree about this.. does anyone have any insights?

Here is a link to some people in Oregon who seem to disagree with Pearson on this.

Western governors urge Congress to ease land transfers

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E&E  News today:

The Western Governors’ Association today adopted a resolution urging Congress to simplify federal-state land exchanges and circumvent the “complex regulatory requirements” of existing laws including the National Environmental Policy Act.

The measure is one of four resolutions the association, which represents 19 states and three U.S. territories, approved at its annual meeting. The coalition also addressed invasive species, the National Park Service’s deferred maintenance backlog, and conservation of fish and wildlife migration corridors.

In its new policy statement on land exchanges and purchases, WGA called for new laws to ease the impact of “checkerboard land ownership” across Western states.

“Federal and state land managers, land users, the environmental community and the public all agree that the checkerboard land ownership pattern is a major hindrance to effective and ecologically sound management of both federal and state lands,” the resolution states.

From my experience as a county forest advisory group member, I applaud efforts to make relatively small transfers easier. Trading similar parcels — say, of up to 640 acres, usually less — can take years, or is virtually impossible. It’s a bit easier with the BLM.