Drought, Fire and Extreme Weather

Large, hot, fast-moving wildfires are an increasing threat to communities and to the watersheds they rely upon. Forest managers work to reduce the risk from these fires using forest thinning and prescribed burning to reduce the amount of fuel in the forest. However, these activities are expensive, and it can be challenging to identify which acres of forest should be targeted with thinning and burn

In the North Central region, invasive species and climate change are intricately linked to changing fire regimes, and together, these drivers can have pronounced effects on ecosystems. When fires burn too hot or too frequently, they can prevent slow-growing native plants from regrowing. When this happens, the landscape can transform into a new type of ecosystem, such as a forest becoming a grassla

Characterized by their extreme size, intensity, and severity, megafires are the most destructive, dangerous, and costly wildfires in the U.S. Over the past two decades, megafires have become more frequent in Oklahoma and Texas along with increasing extreme weather events and changes to fuel types caused by woody plant encroachment into grasslands. As climate change and woody plant encroachment are

Wildfire burn areas are increasing in the western U.S., a change that has been linked to increased fuel aridity caused by climate change. Recognizing that there will likely be even more large fires in the future presents an opportunity to prepare and adapt to the expected climatic changes. This project addresses three key science questions: 1) Is there a specific level (threshold) of fuel aridi

The United States National Park Service (NPS) declared climate change as “the greatest threat to the integrity of our national parks that we have ever experienced.” Climate change is causing not only higher average temperatures in most places but also increasing the severity of storms, the number of heatwaves and wildfires, and causing heavier rainfall. These extreme weather conditions pose major

Climatic warming has contributed to recent increases in severe wildfires across the Pacific Northwest (PNW). Following severe wildfire, a burned forest has an increased likelihood burning again within several decades, which can greatly alter vegetation recovery. These changes are of increasing concern to forest managers, conservationists, researchers, the public, and culture bearers. However, more

The California Coast has hundreds of tree groves where dual management practices aim to reduce the risk of fire and to conserve habitat for overwintering monarch butterflies. As the climate changes, longer high-intensity droughts can increase mortality and/or limb loss in grove trees which causes an accumulation of fire-prone fuels. Moreover, these trees provide the critical habitat for overwinter

The Midwest United States is facing wetter winters and springs and more variable precipitation in the summer and fall. Heavy floods and prolonged droughts are costly to agriculture, housing, transportation infrastructure, and recreational opportunities across the region. These extremes also stress the health of freshwater ecosystems that are important to the regional economy and quality of life. T

In recent years, a number of catastrophic wildfires have fundamentally changed species composition and structure across a large area of the Sierra Nevada of California. These fires leave behind many large, severely burned patches of land where the majority of trees have died. To make informed management decisions, forest managers need to understand the long-term effects of these fires on vegetatio

Cherokee Peoples have had a sustained presence in the southern Appalachians over the past 12,000 years, with a peak population of about 250,000 people inhabiting approximately 32 million hectares across Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia, Virginia, and the Carolinas. Early contact with European settlers caused drastic population declines and land loss, due to disease, land cessio

Wildfire, drought, and insects are reshaping forests in the Western United States in a manner that is being exacerbated by warming temperatures. Disturbance events such as these can significantly alter the amount of land that is covered by forest in an area or region. Consequently, changes in forest cover from disturbance can impact water runoff conditions leading to dangerous flooding, erosion, a

Vegetation transformations after wildfires are a growing issue for forest and shrubland managers in the Inland Pacific Northwest. Severe fires combined with persistent drought and invasive species can slow or prevent the recovery of burned forests and shrublands to their pre-fire states, resulting in ecological, economic, and cultural losses. Forests may be converted to shrub fields or grasslands,