March 2012: FRCC Workshop – (Albuquerque, NM and Flagstaff, AZ)

Fire Regime Condition Class (FRCC) assessments have been widely used for evaluating ecosystem status in many areas of the U.S. FRCC employs state-and-transition modeling to describe historical vegetation and fire regimes, which provides reference information related to landscape fire frequency, severity, and vegetation composition. Similarity indexing is used to compare historical versus current vegetation and …

January-March 2012: Computer Modeling for Fuels Specialists

The purpose of this workshop/webinar hybrid is to develop a working knowledge of computer models and their applications as needed to provide vegetation and fuels assessment input for unit and project-level planning. Fuels specialists in particular need tools that will help them assess existing and future vegetation conditions and the impact of treatments on fire …

May 16, 2012: Wildland Fire Assessment Tool

Presenter: Eva Strand & Josh Hyde (NIFTT University of Idaho) WFAT provides an interface between ArcMap, FlamMap 5, and the First Order Fire Effects Model (FOFEM), combining their strengths into a spatial fire behavior and fire effects analysis tool in GIS. In the webinar, you will learn how to use WFAT to locate potential fuel …

December 14, 2011: Carbon and water balances of southwestern ponderosa pine forests

In this webinar Dr. Thomas Kolb summarized the key findings of a six-year study of impacts of intense fire and fuel-reduction thinning on the carbon and water balances of ponderosa pine forests in Arizona. The results should be of interest to fire and forest managers and climate change scientists who want more information about impacts …

October 19, 2011: Fuel Treatment Effectiveness on the Wallow Fire

Presenters: Jim Pitts and Judy Palmer (USFS) A small team was assembled to work with the Apache-Sitgreave National Forest and local partners to assess the effects of the fuel treatments and compile a report with the findings. The report “How Fuel Treatments Saved Homes from the 2011 Wallow Fire” was the product of this effort. …

March 2010: Ecological Impact of Mastication

Mike Battaglia (USFS RMRS) presented results from the Joint Fire Science Project on the Ecological Impact of Mastication. Mike reported on the impact of mastication on the chemical and physical conditions of the forest floor, vegetation regrowth, and fuel development. The study included 18 sites across four ecosystems of the southern Rocky Mountains and the …

July 28, 2010: A Synthesis of the Science on Forests and Carbon for U.S. Forests

Dr. Mike Ryan, USDA Forest Service Research Forest Ecologist, presented a scientific synthesis of the forest carbon cycle. The synthesis covers the entire US, but Dr. Ryan focused on the western US for this webinar. Forests play a key role in the carbon cycle and their growth and harvested wood products currently offsets 12-19% of …

Buffelgrass: Southern Arizona Fights Back

The ecological and economic threat that buffelgrass poses to the community of Tucson and the surrounding area has sparked an unprecedented level of cooperation among land managers, nonprofits, government at all levels, and representatives from the business community. The Southern Arizona Buffelgrass Coordination Center represents a model of cross-­‐jurisdiction cooperation and community engagement in response to an environmental threat.

Click here for accompanying “Buffelgrass” write up containing more detail.


March 21, 2012: LANDFIRE Total Fuel Change Tool

Presenters: Tobin Smail & Charley Martin, (US Geological Survey). The LANDFIRE Total Fuel Change Tool (LFTFC) allows users to edit LANDFIRE fuels attributes and associated layers directly with an ArcMap Toolbar. This webinar provides an overview of LFTFC’s capabilities to edit and add rule sets for changing fuel attributes based on existing vegetation type (EVT), …