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Elevation-dependent influence of snow accumulation on forest greening
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Rising temperatures and declining water availability have influenced the ecological function of mountain forests over the past half-century. For instance, warming in spring and summer and shifts towards earlier snowmelt are associated with an increase in wildfire activity and tree mortality in mountain forests in the western United States (1,2). Temperature increases are expected to continue during the twenty-first century in mountain ecosystems across the globe (3,4), with uncertain consequences. Here, we examine the influence of interannual variations in snowpack accumulation on forest greenness in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, California, between 1982 and 2006. Using observational records of snow accumulation and satellite data on vegetation greenness we show that vegetation greenness increases with snow accumulation. Indeed, we show that variations in maximum snow accumulation explain over 50% of the interannual variability in peak forest greenness across the Sierra Nevada region. The extent to which snow accumulation can explain variations in greenness varies with elevation, reaching a maximum in the water-limited mid- elevations, between 2,000 and 2,600 m. In situ measurements of carbon uptake and snow accumulation along an elevational transect in the region confirm the elevation dependence of this relationship. We suggest that mid-elevation mountain forest ecosystems could prove particularly sensitive to future increases in temperature and concurrent changes in snow accumulation and melt.
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Fire and a Changing Climate - Fueling Collaboration
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Webinar from the Fueling Collaboration Series. Jenifer Bunty (Consortium of Appalachian Fire Managers & Scientists/Clemson University) moderates a panel of fire professionals and climate change specialists. They discuss how to incorporate climate change predictions/models into forest and fire management and give updates on the latest fire science and climate change research.
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Online Training Programs and Materials
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Forest Service Report Highlights Restoration Progress Made Despite Growing Challenges
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The U.S. Forest Service has increased the pace and scale of forest restoration by nine percent since 2011, according to a report released today. The significant progress comes in the face of mounting challenges to the agency including record droughts, longer wildfire seasons and the increasing percentage of the agency’s budget spent fighting wildland fires.
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ForesTech
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ForesTech provides a broad spectrum of custom forestry solutions and on the ground services to investment organizations, private landowners and public entities, backed by the highest levels of expertise in the industry.
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Golden-Winged Warbler Habitat: Best Management Practices for Forestlands in Maryland and Pennsylvania
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This document presents management prescriptions to forestland managers interested in providing breeding habitat for Golden-winged Warblers through management actions associated with timber harvesting.
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Information Materials
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Fact Sheets
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Golden-Winged Warbler Appalachians Fact Sheets
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Guidebook for Prescribed Burning in the Southern Region
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Learn how to plan, conduct and evaluate prescribed burns with this new Guidebook designed for burners of all skill levels. This book takes you step-by-step through the prescribed burning process in addition to providing more in-depth chapters on many of the concepts.
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Publications, fact sheets, training materials
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Illinois Division of Forestry Resources
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It is the mission of the Illinois Division of Forestry Resources to protect, perpetuate, restore, conserve, and manage the forest and related resources of Illinois, both public and private, rural and urban; and to ensure for future generations the greatest economic, scientific, and social benefits that can only be provided through a forest ecological system.
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Indiana Department of Natural Resources Division of Forestry
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Your state forests are managed under the policy of multiple use in order to obtain benefits from recreation, timber production and watershed protection.
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Invited Review: Quantifying surface albedo and other direct biogeophysical climate forcings of forestry activities
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By altering fluxes of heat, momentum, and moisture exchanges between the land surface and atmosphere, forestry and other land-use activities affect climate. Although long recognized scientifically as being important, these so-called biogeophysical forcings are rarely included in climate policies for forestry and other land management projects due to the many challenges associated with their quantification. Here, we review the scientific literature in the fields of atmospheric science and terrestrial ecology in light of three main objectives: (i) to elucidate the challenges associated with quantifying biogeophysical climate forcings connected to land use and land management, with a focus on the forestry sector; (ii) to identify and describe scientific approaches and/or metrics facilitating the quantification and interpretation of direct biogeophysical climate forcings; and (iii) to identify and recommend research priorities that can help overcome the challenges of their attribution to specific land-use activities, bridging the knowledge gap between the climate modeling, forest ecology, and resource management communities. We find that ignoring surface
biogeophysics may mislead climate mitigation policies, yet existing metrics are unlikely to be sufficient. Successful metrics ought to (i) include both radiative and nonradiative climate forcings; (ii) reconcile disparities between biogeophysical and biogeochemical forcings, and (iii) acknowledge trade-offs between global and local climate benefits. We call for more coordinated research among terrestrial ecologists, resource managers, and coupled climate modelers to harmonize datasets, refine analytical techniques, and corroborate and validate metrics that are more amenable to analyses at the scale of an individual site or region.
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KGS/Fort Novosel
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In support of Fort Novosel’s Natural Resources Program, KGS/Trinity assisted with invasive species management, forest management inventories, timber marking, and prescribed burns and also incorporated wildlife, flora/fauna, and aquatic species survey data into geodatabases and map overlays.
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