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Fire Chronicle #9
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Laura McCarthy, Forest Trust
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May 24, 2002 09:51 PDT
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FIRE CHRONICLE: Stories of the National Fire Plan
Number 9
May 24, 2002
NATIONAL PARTNERSHIP ADVANCES LANDSCAPE-SCALE FOREST RESTORATION
By Laura McCarthy
The USDA Forest Service and Department of Interior are slowly chipping
away at the task of treating hazardous fuels. However, they face
enormous challenges in gearing up to conduct enough thinning and
prescribed burning to meet the goals of the National Fire Plan. The
agencies report that they reduced hazardous fuels on 2.25 million acres
in 2001 and that most of the projects were 50 to 1,000 acres in size.
The Fire Modeling Institute of the USDA Forest Service estimates that
126 million acres of federal forest ecosystems that are adapted to
frequent low- and mixed-severity fire are now at high risk of losing key
ecosystem components to wildfire. Thus, the 2.25 million acres treated
by the agencies in 2001 is less than one percent of the total acreage
needing restoration.
The Nature Conservancy has launched a new partnership with the Forest
Service and Department of Interior to expand the scale of fire-adapted
ecosystem restoration to hundreds of thousands or even millions of
acres. The partnership – called the Collaboration to Restore
Fire-Adapted Ecosystems – created a Fire Learning Network to test a
process for using science and collaborative planning to restore natural
fire regimes in 25 landscapes across the U.S. These landscapes are of
mixed ownership, including federal, state, tribal and private land, and
contain both wildland-urban interface areas and vast expanses of
wildland ecosystems.
The Fire Learning Network sought participants through a competitive
proposal process in January 2002 with funds from the National Fire Plan.
Teams from The Nature Conservancy, state, federal, and county agencies,
and private partners applied for modest funding to support the first
year of participation in the two-year Fire Learning Network. The
applicants committed to: (1) use collaborative planning to set landscape
goals; (2) develop scientific information to inform fire management
planning; and (3) engage in four intensive workshops over the two-year
period. Five landscapes were made demonstration sites with the
expectation that they would make more progress to accomplish the network
goals, and would then impart lessons learned to the network’s 20 other
landscape teams and to land managers across the nation.
A strength of the Fire Learning Network is that it provides well-defined
methods for incorporating science into landscape restoration planning.
For example, each project team is required to develop conceptual
ecological models of the structure and dynamics of their landscape’s
fire-adapted systems. These state-transition models answer four key
questions: (1) what state is the ecosystem in now; (2) how did the
ecosystem get to its current condition; (3) how is the ecosystem
expected to change in the future; and (4) what is the desired future
ecosystem condition?
The landscape teams created conceptual ecological models in preparation
for the first Fire Learning Network workshop in April 2002. The modelers
considered different forest types, natural succession processes, natural
disturbance processes, abiotic/environmental factors and constraints,
and the effects of human-caused disturbances and land uses. The models
distinguished between abiotic constraints on ecosystem structure and
function and agents of change that would lead the ecosystem from one
state to another. For each state, the modelers described the threshold
conditions necessary for a transition between states. In some cases, the
modelers could draw upon scientific literature to describe the threshold
conditions, but in other instances they had to rely on expert opinion
and their own field experience.
The Fire Learning Network encourages agency and partner staff to work
collaboratively to develop ecological models, and then to use them as
planning tools. Some of the teams found the models useful to establish a
common understanding of ecosystem dynamics among stakeholders. Others
found the models helped to create shared goals for landscape
restoration. Among partners from agencies with differing mandates and
cultures, discussion of conceptual ecological models became a vehicle
for identifying areas of agreement about ecosystem degradation and
opportunities for management changes. This shared problem solving has
helped the agencies to engage in effective collaborative work.
The Fire Learning Network program will result in fire restoration plans
for 38 million acres across multiple ownerships. The partnership is
helping the Forest Service and Department of Interior to dramatically
expand the restoration of fire-adapted forests to a meaningful scale,
and is doing so by utilizing ecological models and fostering interagency
collaboration. Funds to implement plans generated by the Fire Learning
Network will still need to be allocated through regular National Fire
Plan channels. When this happens, we can expect to see the effectiveness
of the hazardous fuel reduction program increase significantly.
FIRE LEARNING NETWORK information is available at
http://tnc-ecomanagement.org/fire/ or by contacting Ayn Shlisky at
ashl-@tnc.org or Doug Zollner at dzol-@tnc.org.
FIRE CHRONICLE is edited by the Forest Trust. We welcome your comments,
stories, and observations about how the national fire plan is being
implemented (just send a reply message and it will go to the list
moderator). To subscribe to FIRE CHRONICLE or to read past issues go to
http://www.topica.com/lists/firechronicles/ or send an email message to
lau-@theforesttrust.org
COMMUNITY STEWARDSHIP COMMUNICATOR is an electronic bulletin that
provides information about the national Community Stewardship
Collaborative’s effort to find solutions to issues related to
large-scale watershed projects on the national forests and the national
fire plan. The bulletin is prepared by the Pinchot Institute for
Conservation and is available by contacting nra-@pinchot.org
PAST ISSUES OF FIRE CHRONICLE:
1. 2002 Fire Plan Appropriations will Benefit from 2001 Experience
2. Wildland-Urban Interface Definition a Barrier to Accountability
3. Stewardship Blocks: Innovative Tool Brings Fire Plan Benefits into
Community
4. Youth Training Needed for Fire Plan to Benefit Local Workforce
5. Grants Get National Fire Plan Money into Communities
6. Collaborative Forest Restoration Program Creates New Solution to
Gridlock
7. Permits Regulate Prescribed Burning On Private Land
8. Accountability Remains a Key Issue for National Fire Plan
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