[MCN] USDA Forest Service -- Forests need their dead

[Lance Olsen]

Would You Remove Wood after Pacific Northwest Wildfires?

Removing dead wood from forests post-fire can reduce future fire intensity and boost timber yields—but that same dead wood also shelters many wildlife species when left where it lies. That’s why agency scientists built a model of post-fire recovery  <https://click.news.fs.usda.gov/?qs=dbbe5b2edcebdc6e3f0c62548e8b4663f20044d9e200548aafa0ce810140f793ef273e2a523bf3bd62fbb0f8f02b470ebf201d37571425f50ff8b326b853560a>to help guide wood removals in highly productive Pacific Northwest forests. These landscapes were once considered too wet for destructive fires—an assumption challenged by recent upswings in fire intensity and frequency—and excluded from past models. Study authors found that the benefits of keeping some dead wood as habitat persist for decades in these forests, while the benefits of removing dead wood to reduce fire hazard expire quickly. Study authors stress that managers must consider many factors, including weather, changes in live vegetation, and non-fire disturbances, when removing wood.



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Mora argues that argues that human population size, “...despite being directly or indirectly linked to the deterioration of ecological systems and a key factor for the success of conserving species and ecosystems, has been rarely considered and in fact ‘trivialized or ignored’ by much of the conservation biology community

<<http://dx.doi.org/10.5751/ES-06320-190138>>

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