Dr. John Willis and Dr. Dale Brockway of the US Forest Service Southern Research Station in Auburn, Alabama have released their 2021-2022 regional longleaf pine forecast report. This report includes current cone counts and conelet observations from 11 sites ranging from Louisiana to Florida and up to North Carolina. Fire and land managers can use these data to inform plans to maximize natural regeneration opportunities in mature longleaf stands. Download the full report here. For questions about the report contact Dr. John Willis ([email protected]).
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New May-June 2021 SFE Fire Lines Newsletter Issue
The May – June 2021 issue of the Southern Fire Exchange Fire Lines newsletter is out! Click through to read a research brief on mesophication in eastern US forests, science and technology updates relevant to the Southeast, new video interviews, new wildland fire podcasts, upcoming events, and more! Do you have thoughts about our newsletter? Contact us!
Continue Reading2021 Fire Congress Call for Proposals
The 2021 International Fire Ecology and Management Congress will be held Nov. 30 – Dec. 4 in Miramar Beach, Florida. The conference is being co-hosted by the Association for Fire Ecology and Tall Timbers Research Station. The Southern Fire Exchange is supporting the conference by co-coordinating the conference field trips that will take attendees to locations around North Florida that have examples of overcoming fire management challenges and prescribed fire barriers. Proposals for conference special sessions are now being accepted and general registration will open in July. Read more about the upcoming conference and opportunities for student scholarships.
Continue ReadingSFE Webinar: Restoring the Pine Barrens – Attitudes towards restoration of a threatened ecosystem in the U.S. South
SFE Webinar: Restoring the Pine Barrens – Attitudes towards restoration of a threatened ecosystem in the U.S. South
Description: Fire is a critical element for the restoration of native longleaf pine forests in the southern United States. This research explored public interest in restoration of this threatened ecosystem and the application of prescribed fire, a key component of restoration. We report on a project conducted across eight southern states with the following objectives: (1) to identify if prescribed fire has kept pace with demand for planting longleaf following disaster events and (2) to identify landowners’ and public interest in ecological restoration using science-based prescriptions and how managers may use this information to increase prescribed burning. To address these objectives, we collected data from key informant interviews and a public telephone survey. Results demonstrated several important predictors of social barriers to prescribed burning and types of landowners most likely to burn in longleaf ecosystems. We conclude with a discussion about ways to increase dialogue among stakeholders to help them understand the risks and benefits of appropriate ecosystem management using fire. Following the presentations there will be time for audience Q/A with the speakers.
Scheduled Time: 1:00 – 2:00 PM ET June 29, 2021
Speakers: Dr. Jason Gordon, University of Georgia
Dr. John Willis, US Forest Southern Research Station
Webinar Partners: US Forest Service Southern Region, the University of Georgia, the Southern Fire Exchange, NC State University, and the University of Florida.
Webinar Target Audience: Natural Resource Managers, Park Rangers, Public Information Officers, Outreach Specialists, Cooperative Extension Agents
Webinar Registration Link: https://ufl.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_sBibA3bvSmuWBUgCdHymag
Continue ReadingJob: Postdoc on Indigenous-Led Fire Applications in the Southwest
Full posting here:
The University of California, Davis, in collaboration with the USGS Southwest Climate Adaptation Science Center (SW CASC, https://www.swcasc.arizona.edu
), invites applications for a Postdoctoral Fellowship with a focus on Indigenous-led applications of fire in the Southwest for a 2-year period, beginning June 1, 2021. The postdoc will be able to work across both the Middleton (https://nas.ucdavis.edu/ people/beth-middleton) and Safford (https://safford.faculty. ucdavis.edu/people/) research groups, with projects including cultural burning demonstration, outreach, and education (Middleton); cultural burn policy analysis (Middleton); and the ecological impacts of low-intensity fire on SW and Australian ecosystems (Safford). The postdoc will contribute to the need to understand more of the scope of, challenges and opportunities for, and multifaceted outcomes of Indigenous burning, in California and throughout the SW CASC region—in order to better identify regional or state barriers, activate opportunities, and offer support to cultural fire efforts. Following the best practices of Lam et al. (http://www.ecologyandsociety. org/vol25/iss1/art3/) through research, analysis, synthesis, and knowledge sharing, we endeavor to bridge Western and Indigenous knowledge for fire-focused climate adaptation in southwestern ecosystems. We work collaboratively across the CASC network to respond to research needs and develop relevant products for natural resource managers. Possible areas of focus include the following: – Analyze, assess, and develop strategies to address the multi-scalar policy barriers and/or opportunities to implementing Indigenous-led traditional burning across land jurisdictions and ecosystems
– Asses the scales at which Indigenous cultural burning may be applied to address climate change in Southwest ecosystems
– Assess the ecological and policy potential for Indigenous burning to be recognized as a carbon sequestration strategy that provides ongoing biodiversity maintenance.
– Evaluate impacts of cultural burning on fish, wildlife, soils, and water, with an emphasis on ecological changes in both terrestrial and freshwater aquatic habitats.
– Examine the interacting effects of climate change and other stressors (e.g., invasive species, drought, land use change) and cultural fire, with a particular emphasis on cumulative and interactive impacts, and other potential beneficial synergistic effects of cultural burning to reduce/moderate climatic variability.
It is important for the incumbent to have experience working collaboratively with Indigenous populations and knowledge systems; demonstrated research and writing skills; a capacity for strong conceptual thinking; a commitment to staying abreast of the most recent and most robust science in Indigenous fire policy and/or ecology; and a desire to work as a member of an interdisciplinary team. Candidates must possess the ability to work harmoniously in teams with shared leadership capacity and they must be able to speak and write about complex issues for diverse audiences.
This opportunity is open to individuals who are obtaining or have obtained a PhD in ecology, forestry/wildland fire science, natural resource policy and management, Native American Studies, geography, or related fields. Candidates must have the PhD in hand by the start date.
Interested candidates should submit an application that includes CV, cover letter, and 2 letters of recommendation through the Recruit online portal at: https://recruit.ucdavis.edu/
apply/JPF04105 For full consideration applications should be completed by April 26, 2021. The position is open until filled. This postdoctoral fellowship is part of a larger Postdoctoral Climate Adaptation Scholars (CAS) Program established by the National and Regional Climate Adaptation Science Centers (NRCASC) to support management-relevant research and scientific synthesis of emerging research needs related to climate impacts on fish, wildlife, and ecosystems. The objective of the CAS Program is to provide regional-to-national syntheses of climate change impacts on fire regimes, fire management, and fire response; explore resulting impacts on fish, wildlife and ecosystems; and provide the scientific research necessary to help managers adapt to these changes.
For more information visit: https://recruit.ucdavis.edu/apply/JPF04105.
Continue ReadingJob: Postdoc in Data Science – Southeast Climate Adaptation Science Center
The Southeast CASC through North Carolina State University is hiring a Postdoctoral Research Scholar in Data Science that will work on prescribed fire research related to the Southeast. Some details from the listing:
Continue ReadingThe Department of Applied Ecology at North Carolina State University, in collaboration with the Department of Statistics, the North Carolina Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit, and the USGS Southeast Climate Adaptation Science Center, will be hiring a Postdoctoral Research Scholar in data science to assist with efforts to develop a prototype early warning system for Prescribed Fire Managers (PFMs). The primary research objective of the successful candidate is to characterize short, medium, and long-term climatological-risk for PFMs in the Southeast US, and to build a framework that allows for optimal decision making under uncertainty.
The successful candidate will work with Drs. Brian Reich (Statistics), Jaime Collazo (Applied Ecology), and Adam Terando (USGS) to model environmental conditions conducive to prescribed burning activities over time scales of days to decades in the future. Three major objectives of the position include 1). Define, identify, and model ‘fail-states’, or the sets of conditions that PFMs wish to avoid 2) Model risk exposure of PFMs given existing numerical model simulations of future climate over near-term (days) to long-term (decades) time scales, and 3) develop spatio-temporal models to characterize extreme wildfire risk on decadal time scales.
SFE Webinar Recording Available: COVID-19 Impacts on Southeast Prescribed Fire and Strategies for Keeping Fire on the Ground
The recording of the Southern Fire Exchange webinar from Thursday, February 11th “COVID-19 Impacts on Southeast Prescribed Fire and Strategies for Keeping Fire on the Ground” is now live on the SFE YouTube webinar archive. This webinar featured a research presentation on the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on Southeastern prescribed fire as well as a fire manager panel discussion that covered strategies for managing prescribed fire programs in 2020 and 2021. Webinar presenters included: Benjamin Poulter, Ph.D., NASA Earth Sciences Division and Morgan Varner, Ph.D., Tall Timbers Research Station. The webinar fire manager panelists included: Greg Titus, US Fish and Wildlife Service, Brett Williams, US Air Force Wildland Fire Branch, and Sasha Ernst, Florida Park Service
Click here to view the archived webinar
Click here to download the webinar slides
New Book: The Fire Manager’s Guide to Blue Ridge Ecozones
In “The Fire Manager’s Guide to Blue Ridge Ecozones” a new book from the Southern Blue Ridge Fire Learning Network, TNC fire manager Adam Warwick explores a wide range of fire maintained ecosystems across the Blue Ridge. The beautiful 165 page guide includes full color photographs and illustrations. You can download the full .pdf file here. A print version of the book is expected soon.
Continue ReadingMission Unstoppable – How Does Fire Spead?
In this January 2021 CBS Mission Unstoppable episode, University of Florida fire ecology professor and Southern Fire Exchange program Principle Investigator Dr. Rae Crandall uses match stick forests, metal trees, and a recent prescribed fire to explain basic principles of fire behavior and effects. This short five minute video would be a great introduction to fire in the Southeast.
Continue ReadingNASA Documents Fewer Prescribed Burns During the Pandemic
A new research data dashboard from NASA shows the changes in prescribed fire use during the COVID-19 pandemic. The satellite derived images show the temporal and spatial changes in the amount of fire on the southeastern landscape from March through August of 2020. You can explore the data and then visit the Tall Timbers Research Station online FireTrendR application to for more information about the NASA MODIS and VIIRS Active Fire datasets.
For an in-depth discussion of this project, followed by a panel discussion with regional prescribed fire managers, register for the free Southern Fire Exchange, NASA, and Tall Timbers webinar on February 11th from 1:00 – 2:30 PM ET. The webinar panel discussion will include fire managers from Eglin Air Force Base, the Florida Park Service, and the US Fish and Wildlife Service.
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