Fire and climate change in the Great Basin: Prospects in the middle of the sagebrush sea
Dr. Beth A. Newingham Research Ecologist
USDA - Agricultural Research Service, Reno, NV
Wildfire and Invasives in the Great Basin
Credit: Rob Cox USDA-NRCS
Fire Regime • Increase in fire size • Increase in frequency
- Fire return interval = - Historic >100 years - Current > 2 years
Fire in the Great Basin
209,000 hectares
Murphy Complex 2007
650,000 acres
Long Butte 2010
320,000 acres
Long Draw 2012
560,000 acres
Rush 2012
270,000 acres
Holloway 2012
460,000 acres
Kinyon Road 2012
235,000 acres
2012 • 3.3 million acres
burned • Holloway/Long
Draw Fires- 1 million acres
20% of the Great Basin
Hot Spots
209,000 hectares
Recent, Nearby Fires
209,000 hectares
Overland Strawberry
Wildfire and Invasives in the Great Basin
Credit: Rob Cox USDA-NRCS
• Bureau of Land Management • Average of $33.7 million per year spent on
treatments • 86% is spent in the Great Basin
Emergency Stabilization and Rehabilitation (ESR)
Post-fire Rehabilitation Drill Seeding Aerial Seeding
Post-Fire Rehabilitation
Climate
Grazing
Native Plant Communities Plant Invasion
Soil
Fire Regimes
Wildfire
Research Framework
Fire Regimes 209,000 hectares
N = No Rehab A = Aerial D = Drill
Graduate Student: Chris Bowman-Prideaux Collaborators: Eva Strand, UI Boise and Twin Falls districts, BLM Funding: NASA, Joint Fire Science Program, Stillinger Herbarium, NSF
Question: How do post-fire seeding strategies affect natives, cheatgrass invasion, and fire return intervals?
Burn Severity Questions: 1. How do burn severity
indices correlate with actual severity in sagebrush?
2. How does plant recovery correlate with burn severity?
Collaborators: Eva Strand and Chris Bowman-Prideaux, UI; Jeff Gicklhorn, UNR
Funding: Joint Fire Science Program
Murphy Complex Fire 2007
Treatments Control Warming Drought Warming + drought
Climate Change
Graduate Student: Alex Suazo Collaborators:
Matt Germino, USGS Boise District, BLM
Funding: NSF, USGS
Question: What are the effects of warming and drought on cheatgrass and native bunchgrass emergence?
Climate Change Questions: 1. How does warming and drought affect competition among
natives and cheatgrass, as well as natives and red brome? 2. Are there native seed mixes that may be resistant to cheatgrass
or red brome invasion in future climates?
Collaborators: Keirith Snyder, ARS Funding: Great Basin Native Plant Program Salo 2005. Biological Invasions.
Elevation Gradients
Question: How does elevation, temperature, and precipitation gradients affect cheatgrass distributions?
Low resistance Low resilience
Resistance to invasion Resilience to disturbance
High resistance High resilience
Wind Erosion
Collaborators: Jeff Herrick, USDA-ARS
Nick Webb, NMSU Ben Sullivan, UNR
Paul Verburg, UNR Funding: Working on it….
National Wind Erosion Research Network
Site locations – TBD ( = proposed)
Wind Erosion
Collaborators: Ben Sullivan, UNR
Paul Verburg, UNR Funding: Working on it….
• Quantify and predict post-fire dust emissions
• Determine effects of pre- and post-fire management on dust
• ESR = Emergency Stabilization and Rehabilitation
• Advising agencies – Soil monitoring
• Wind erosion • Water erosion
– Weather stations – Monitoring design
Project Lead: Camie Dencker Collaborators:
Eastern Nevada Landscape Coalition Ely District BLM
Funding: Ely District BLM
ESR Monitoring
Spring Valley Field Station
Opportunities for: RESEARCH
• Gradient studies • Wind erosion network • Fire and post-fire
rehabilitation TEACHING/OUTREACH
• Agency trainings • GB Fire Science Exchange
workshops
Facility Needs: • Lab space • Meeting/training rooms • Housing
Acknowledgements Cooperators/Collaborators:
• Bureau of Land Management • USFS Rocky Mountain Research Station • US Geological Survey • Agricultural Research Service • Natural Resource Conservation Service • National Park Service • US Fish and Wildlife Service • US Air Force • Idaho Fish and Game • Idaho Department of Lands • Truax Company, Inc. • OX Ranch • The Nature Conservancy • Numerous universities
Soda Fire, August 2015
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