Wm Briggs Co Ltd Needle Art Peaks and Pines

SUMMARY

Historically, the ponderosa and dry mixed-conifer forests of the Colorado Front Range were more open up and grassy, and trees of all size classes were constitute in a grouped arrangement with sizable openings between the clumps. Equally a legacy of fire suppression, today's forests are denser, with smaller copse. Proactive restoration of this forest type volition assist to reduce fuel loads and the take a chance of large and severe wildfires in the Colorado Front Range. Using the best-bachelor information on the historical conditions of these forests to develop "desired weather condition" for restoration, the Rocky Mountain Enquiry Station has published Principles and Practices for the Restoration of Ponderosa Pine and Dry Mixed-Conifer Forests of the Colorado Forepart Range (RMRS-GTR-373).

This guide was produced and reviewed by a range of scientists and managers from federal agencies, environmental non-profits, and academia to address the unique forest structure and burn down regime of this area as well as synthesize electric current Forepart Range forest science. It aims to aid the direction community sympathise the desired weather condition for these forests, the principles backside the restoration recommendations made, and steps for implementing the principles. The guide is being released with a companion certificate, Visualization of Heterogeneous Forest Structures Post-obit Handling in the Southern Rocky Mountains, (RMRS-GTR-365) which allows users to "meet" what the recommended treatments may await like at the stand level.

In 1860, a typical ponderosa pine forest forth the Colorado Front Range looked quite different from what is seen today. Back so, these forests were open and grassy enough for you lot to easily gallop your equus caballus through, weaving between widely-spread out clumps of copse. Today, notwithstanding, many of these same forests are much denser - crowded with smaller trees - making them vulnerable to large wildfires, insect epidemics and disease.

Colorado's Forepart Range has experienced an increased number of large, loftier-severity wildfires over the past two decades. These fires have compromised watersheds, critical wildlife habitat, and caused concern about water quality, erosion and natural tree regeneration. According to Greg Aplet of the Wilderness Society, "Nosotros take been faced for some time with this looming and continuing problem of what to do nearly contradistinct forest conditions, and the (associated) burn down behavior and fire effects." Since the early 1990'due south forest managers and others have increasingly recognized the demand for proactive forest management to make the mural more resilient to fire and other disturbances, but have been challenged by a lack of clear goals based in scientific understanding.

The Front Range Roundtable -- formed in 2004 and representing the diverse agencies and organizations involved in forest direction across 11 counties on the Colorado Front Range -- identified approximately ane.five 1000000 acres in demand of forest management to mitigate wildfire hazard, protect communities, and restore wood structure and composition in this area/region. Working with the Arapaho Roosevelt and Pike San Isabel National Forests, the Front Range Roundtable was an important part of the Collaborative Woods Landscape Restoration Program (CFLRP) award received past these national forests in 2010. The CFLR program supports the very types of restoration projects the Front Range Roundtable has prioritized. One of the provisions of the CFLRP was that there had to exist a monitoring program in place which measured progress toward "desired conditions" of these forests, but at the time when the grant was awarded, these desired conditions were undefined. Mike Battaglia, a USFS researcher, recalls, "At the fourth dimension, we thought it would be like shooting fish in a barrel to describe them. Just when we convened these working groups, we realized that nosotros really had no common definition for what forest restoration was in this area, and didn't know what our 'desired atmospheric condition' were."

The Colorado Front Range CLFRP'southward effort to ascertain a mutual definition of forest restoration in the intervening years has led to a flurry of enquiry on the ecology and historical conditions of Front Range forests. The recently published "Principles and Practices for the Restoration of Ponderosa Pine and Dry Mixed-Conifer Forests of the Colorado Front Range" (RMRS-GTR-373) provides a synthesis of information specific to Colorado's Front Range, while outlining a framework to guide wood management and handling design criteria that can be used by land managers far and broad. Atomic number 82 author Rob Addington of The Nature Conservancy says, "Our goal with this GTR was to explore ways of meeting fuels reduction objectives and changing wildfire behavior, but doing it in a fashion that considers how the forest was structured historically and what kind of woods we expect in the time to come."

"Bergen Park" was painted by John Frederick Kensett circa 1870. The painting illustrates the open, spatially-variable structure of a ponderosa pine stand with an open understory typical of some Forepart Range forests at that fourth dimension.

Another goal of the authors for GTR-373 is to outline a process that promotes an inclusive and holistic multi-resource benefit approach to the Front end Range's natural diversity of local landscapes and land ownership. Jonas Feinstein of the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service says, "Early on, we recognized that the Front end Range's dry forest types are roughly separate in ownership between private and public lands, and that both good and "uncharacteristic" natural processes do not confine themselves to these ownership boundaries."

Central FINDINGS

Historical stand reconstruction shows that the ponderosa and dry mixed conifer forests of Colorado's Forepart Range were more open and grassy than they are today, with a very variable mix of tree sizes that were oftentimes clumped together.
Much of the Front Range is characterized by a mixed-severity fire regime, with depression, moderate, and high severity fire effects all having occurred historically, based on factors such as summit and slope.
The forest structure and limerick of the Front end Range is shaped at multiple scales by interactions amidst topography, natural disturbances such as fire, and forest developmental processes. This serves as a foundation for identifying priority areas for treatment and designing restoration projects across scales.

Extent of ponderosa and dry mixed-conifer forest types (along with other forest cover types) of the Colorado Front Range that are the subject of this GTR. (figure by R. Addington)

Extent of ponderosa and dry out mixed-conifer wood types (forth with other forest cover types) of the Colorado Front Range that are the discipline of this GTR. (figure by R. Addington)

How volition this restoration guide be useful for forest managers?

A ponderosa pine stand in the Front Range differs from one in California or the Black Hills because physical site characteristics and weather of this area create unique fire behavior patterns and stand assemblages across the landscape. Several regional guides addressed managing western dry out mixed conifer forests (for example, Managing Sierra Nevada Forests [GTR-PSW-237], and Restoring Composition and Structure in Southwestern Frequent-Fire Forests [RMRS-GTR-310]), but none were specific to Colorado's Forepart Range, and so they lack sufficient detail for planning, projection design, implementation and monitoring with the CFLRP collaborative management framework. Addington explains, "We began to recollect most how the Front end Range is different than these other regions, then noticing that these other GTRs were gaining popularity. Fifty-fifty at present, a lot of people are using GTR-310 on the Front Range as a guide for woods management, just we determined that at that place were some unique things near the Front Range that justified a restoration guide specifically for this expanse."

The GTR was produced and reviewed past a very large number and wide range of scientists and managers from federal agencies, environmental non-profits, and academia, which has helped to ensure that parties with expertise and interest in the future of these forests have, importantly, had a hand in shaping the recommendations. Jeff Underhill, a Regional Silviculturist with the USFS explains, "I would say externally, that this GTR will be useful for all of the partners that we work with, both federal and nonfederal. On the federal side, it will be useful for the line officers and people doing NEPA reports at the USFS, and people at NRCS and USGS. We likewise work with the Nature Salvation, the Wilderness Society, and area Parks and Recreation offices. Exterior of that, it could have utility for a whole range of people, including members of the public who are interested in this type of piece of work. It is besides a practiced primer on the ecology of Front end Range forests for whatsoever USFS employees new to the surface area."

Tony Cheng, Director of the Colorado Forest Restoration Institute at Colorado State University emphasizes that this restoration framework is designed to be utilized inside an interdisciplinary team context. "It requires bringing in not merely timber and fuels people, just also the wildlife biologists, hydrologist, soil scientists, recreation people to really take a more integrated discussion most ecological integrity equally a guiding principle in restoration."

How practise today'southward Colorado Front Range Forests compare to historical weather condition?

Paired historical and current photographs of the Cheesman Reservoir landscape (near Denver CO) illustrating the general increase in forest density and loss of openings that occurred from the late 1890's to 2000. (photos from 2000 by M. Kaufmann)

Paired historical and current photographs of the Cheesman Reservoir landscape (about Denver CO) illustrating the full general increase in forest density and loss of openings that occurred from the tardily 1890'southward to 2000. (photos from 2000 by M. Kaufmann)

Understanding the unique local conditions – both past and present – is an important jumping-off signal for forest restoration and identifying the desired endpoints. When researchers started to compile the available science for this GTR, they used data from all over – from the southwestern U.s. to the Northern Rockies. They found plenty of evidence that there were some commonalities in ponderosa pine and dry-mixed conifer stands throughout the region – all were characterized historically past physical complexity and uneven-anile forests with a highly variable arrangement in clumps of trees and openings. But over the past several years, stand up reconstruction work [Run across subheading on Using Historical Forest Stand Reconstruction] on the Rocky Mountain Front Range from Laramie WY to Colorado Springs has revealed unique attributes of these forests.

Dorsum in the mid-1800s, Front Range forests were more than open up and grassy, and stands were two to 3 times less dumbo. There were trees of all size classes in a "groupy-clumpy" arrangement, where the groups of trees were separated past openings (ordinarily less than one acre). At the landscape calibration, there was a rich mural mosaic with uneven-aged, mature forest maintained by depression-severity fire that was intermixed with early- and mid-successional wood patches and shifting minor openings created past very pocket-size patches of high-severity fire. The specific climate and soil productivity in this area affect, for example, the number of copse in a grouping, the proportions of groups vs. single trees, the size of the trees, and the stand density compared to the region equally a whole.

Feinstein explains, "If y'all looked at historic conditions, dry forest types exhibited this wonderful diverseness of forest structures that created pocket-sized-scale topographic variation based on soils, moisture, and productivity gradients. It is these very small-calibration gradients that promoted site-specific complexity and resulted in the unique local landscape variety and evolutionary environment of the Colorado Front Range dry out mixed conifer forests." This construction has been both a driver and production of the historical burn regime. Much of the Front Range had a mixed-severity fire regime, with low, moderate, and loftier-severity fire effects all having occurred in these forests based on factors such every bit elevation and slope. The mix of tree sizes was maintained by frequent surface burn (with small-scale patches of stand up-replacing or high-severity burn), which left much of the forest awning intact but regularly reduced the constant build-up of surface fuels and kept copse from filling in the pocket-sized grass-forb openings.

Afterwards decades of fire suppression, tree infill into these openings has created more than of a closed canopy forest today. Large-calibration, high-severity fire has reduced the number of old trees and old-growth forests, with negative consequences for wildlife that rely on them. Low- and moderate severity fires that are of import for shaping the structure and limerick of Front Range forests occur less oftentimes now than they did historically. It is less clear how the composition of the woods understory has changed, merely it is assumed that the depression light availability combined with the accumulation of litter has had a negative upshot, along with competition from non-native weed species.

Co-ordinate to Battaglia, "The landscape that we've reconstructed from the by was highly variable, having to practice with fourth dimension since the concluding burn down and also factors such as slope, elevation, and soil type. Nosotros now know that 'thin to xl and phone call it adept' is non actually a expert approach to restoring these forests." And so, where to start?

Restoration principles for Front Range Forests

This figure shows the variation in forest structure on the Colorado Front Range, which reflects slope, aspect, and underlying moisture gradients. (figure by J. Feinstein and R. Addington)

This figure shows the variation in forest construction on the Colorado Forepart Range, which reflects slope, attribute, and underlying moisture gradients. (figure by J. Feinstein and R. Addington

The GTR describes principles for restoration of Colorado Front Range forests. Tony Cheng describes the style he sees the GTR being used equally such: "We accept a landscape-scale set of principles and concepts, and and so we zoom down to stands where the silviculturists or field-level people are operating. We provide a series of concepts and principles of what you would do in each area that would lucifer the ecological attributes of fire adapted ponderosa pino so far as we understand them." We nowadays five of these restoration principles below.

Historical forest conditions guide restoration practices, but don't constrain them

Forest restoration is based on the principle that ecological systems were resilient to climatic fluctuations and natural disturbances historically, and therefore the historical conditions
is a practiced starting betoken. The historical weather condition improve our agreement of where electric current forest conditions are significantly unlike from historical conditions, and therefore where restoration should be prioritized. This provides benchmarks or targets for the development of desired weather to be achieved through management and natural disturbances.

Restoration is based on models of local conditions

When thinking about restoration at a local level, information technology is important to consider how climate, physical factors, natural disturbances and forest developmental processes all come together to shape woods structure and composition. Consideration of how these factors would interact under intact disturbance regimes can help to develop a local ecological model to accost questions of where to treat and how to design and implement treatments.

Restoration complements natural variation in forest construction by environmental gradients

The spatial design of trees at both the landscape and stand up scales in mountainous terrain is heavily influenced past environmental gradients. The key environmental gradients for restoration work on the Front Range include latitude, top, slope position and steepness, attribute, and soils, and the influence these gradients have on solar radiations and wet. In general, south-facing slopes are characterized past open, ponderosa pine woodlands with trees occurring both in groups and as scattered individuals. Forest density increases in areas with higher wet, such as due north-facing slopes. The proportion of Douglas-fir typically increases with increasing moisture. Aspen is also an important forest component, typically occupying areas with higher wet availability. These gradients and their influence on tree patterns should factor into restoration planning.

Spatial scale provides an of import organizational framework for restoration

Private stands are part of a larger mural, and GTR-373 stresses the importance of developing prescriptions based on the landscape context. The authors distinguish broadly between the landscape calibration and the treatment scale, with strategic planning happening at the mural scale and implementation being washed at the treatment scale. The GTR describes how variation at fine scales "rolls up" to create patterns at broader scales, driven largely by site environmental weather condition and interactions with disturbance regimes.

Natural patterns of tree bloodshed tin help to guide restoration practices

Fire, insects and illness, windthrow, and lightning are the primary natural disturbance agents affecting Front end Range ponderosa pine and dry out mixed-conifer forests. The GTR emphasizes the importance of understanding these natural patterns of tree mortality to provide data for restoration treatments, specially for the typical patch sizes created by burn down and beetle kill, and the implications of these disturbances for stand structure. With this understanding and through field-based assessments, planners can then identify both common and rare structural elements on the current landscape and manage for those rare elements. For case, if openings are absent-minded in the current mural, then cut patches (of variable sizes) may be an advisable treatment pick to mimic fine-calibration patches created by high-severity burn. If, however, the low-density forest patches that were once common are rare in the current landscape, then an uneven-aged grouping pick and retention approach that enhances spatial variability throughout the treatment expanse may be a adept
option.

MANAGEMENT APPLICATIONS

Using the knowledge gained from historical reconstruction (for example, the spatial variability in pre-settlement stands) to guide restoration is likely to have many benefits, including making the landscape more than resilient to fire, drought, and insect outbreaks.
The direction framework as laid out in the GTR is: the identification of priority areas, planning treatments at the stand or mural scale based on natural gradients, assessing how natural disturbance would interact with these gradients, and using that information to help develop actual on-the-basis treatments.
The general outcomes of the management recommendations in the GTR are reduction in woods densities and surface and crown fuels, enhancement of spatial heterogeneity across scales, and retention of drought-and fire-tolerant species, old trees, and structures important for wildlife.

Implementing restoration practices

The GTR lays out not only the "whys" for restoration of these forest types, only besides explains the "hows" for practitioners. The basic framework for approaching restoration is: place priority areas, plan treatments at the stand up or landscape scale based on natural gradients, assess how natural disturbance would interact with these gradients, and utilize that data to assist develop bodily on-the-ground treatments. Nosotros have briefly summarized the seven restoration steps in the box to the right.

How does this type of forest restoration do good the Forepart Range landscape?

The authors intend for this document to provide useful context for larger-scale landscape planning for Forepart Range country managers. Rob Addington explains, "The information we've
provided helps to validate some of the piece of work that managers are already doing and provides a blueprint for how it might be washed within the context of their existing planning."

One of the main goals of forest restoration as laid out in the GTR is to influence fire beliefs, especially in those areas currently susceptible to large-scale loftier-intensity burn due to high tree densities and awning cover. This can exist done through a combination of mechanical thinning and prescribed fire. The prescribed fire chemical element is important because burning influences nutrient cycling and cues germination or resprouting of some fire-adapted understory plant species. Battaglia says, "Even without these ecological benefits, if you don't burn down, you lot go a buildup of needle litter and woods, and these high surface fuels are a big issue to bargain with because they take and then long to decompose."

Ideally, restoration treatments would be aimed at restoring the historical mixed-severity fire regime, simply implementing prescribed burning treatments is challenging on the Front Range due to social perceptions and safety concerns. Thus, areas historically characterized by a predominately low- and moderate-severity burn down regime represent the highest priority for restoration, through mechanical treatment and reintroduction of [prescribed] fire. "The idea is not necessarily to use treatments to mimic what a burn would do on the landscape. What nosotros desire to do is to set up the landscape to receive burn down in a style that and so preserves future options for wood recovery and sustainability past limiting the size of high severity burn down patches," explains Cheng.

Forest restoration is beneficial to other aspects of forest health as well. Addington says, "We call up that these lower-density stands with trees arranged in the grouped spatial pattern with big openings like nosotros saw historically -- this configuration will create a more resilient stand for the hereafter nether increased wildfire activity similar we expect with climate change. This spatial arrangement will alleviate some of the drought stress due to lower tree densities and the breaks in the stand will also slow the spread of insects and disease."

What are barriers to forest restoration on the Colorado Front Range?

Prescribed fire is an important element of restoration in Colorado's Front Range because burning influences nutrient cycling and cues germination or resprouting of some fire-adapted understory plant species. (photo by S. Alton)

Prescribed fire is an important element of restoration in Colorado's Front Range because burning influences food cycling and cues germination or resprouting of some fire-adjusted understory plant species. (photo past S. Alton)

Will implementing the restoration plans in the GTR be simple? Probably not. "The prescriptions that we're talking near to achieve some of these desired future conditions, they're pretty complex – they're really the nigh complex prescriptions that I recall that we have to implement," admits Underhill. He emphasizes the importance of prioritizing where we employ the more than complex prescriptions with the overall objective of increasing heterogeneity at the landscape level.

At that place is also the issue of cost and efficiency for people on the basis implementing these treatments. First, since there is a express timber market on the Front Range, treatments end up existence a cyberspace cost. Then, the restoration recommendations represent a different way of doing things, equally foresters are used to working with even-aged stands with specific tree spacing. "With these more complex prescriptions, the cost of planning, prepping, and operating may actually go up," explains Cheng. "What we're trying to do is produce a variety of ecologically-beneficial attributes with these treatments, where the benefits are only going to be realized many years out. That's a large ask, since in that location'south always pressure level on managers to lower costs. And we are looking for managers to take that risk to build resilience of our forests into the future."

Does the GTR lay out recommended treatments and prescriptions in enough detail to overcome some of these barriers? Underhill explains, "I think that this GTR is at a somewhat higher level than being very prescriptive and the main utility is probably during the planning stage when we're working through NEPA actions and trying to design the projects to achieve the overarching objectives. Merely information technology'south not prescriptive enough for field-course implementation at this point." He thinks that it volition accept more time and data collection from monitoring to be able to write these more detailed prescriptions.

Cheng emphasizes the importance of getting feedback from managers to refine the ideas and recommended treatments in the GTR. "We're not saying: this is the way you ought to do it considering we scientists say so. Nosotros're making assumptions about the future of woods dynamics and the relationship with fire. And and so, we need feedback from people on the basis. We'd similar to know under what conditions this GTR was helpful and when it actually facilitated meeting objectives of operational and cost efficiency, and also what didn't work and needs to be revised."

What is happening now and in the futurity with Front Range wood restoration?

Ponderosa pine woodland in the Roosevelt National Forest near Red Feather Lakes, CO, illustrating the more open, low-density stand structure more typical of Front Range forests in the mid 1800s (photo by P. Brown).

Ponderosa pine woodland in the Roosevelt National Woods almost Red Plumage Lakes, CO, illustrating the more open up, depression-density stand construction more typical of Front Range forests in the mid 1800s (photograph by P. Chocolate-brown).

Restoration treatments are beingness implemented at an increasing rate beyond the Forepart Range because of the CFLRP project, and RMRS scientists and collaborators are studying the outcomes of these treatments to provide feedback that will shape the mode future treatments are designed and executed. The types of inquiry happening now include: effectiveness of restoration treatments (that were implemented early in the CFLRP project); correlating the historical tree data with site characteristic information such equally height, aspect, soil type, and site productivity; and computer simulations on the effect of restoration treatments on fire beliefs.

Climate alter is e'er a consideration in restoration treatments. Battaglia explains that the climate was cooler in the mid-1800s. From that time until the 1920s, there was a lot of stand regeneration due to both harvesting and besides cooler atmospheric condition which led to fewer fires. "And then what do you restore to? Does it make sense to effort to restore to the cooler, moister climate, or do nosotros attempt to use that information to movement into the future?" he asks.

As we motion into a predicted warmer and drier period, he suggests that the current differences betwixt lower and upper montane areas within the Front Range forests may provide some insight. The upper montane is currently a little cooler and moister, and a niggling denser, with a higher proportion of Douglas-fir vs. ponderosa pino. "If I was hedging my bets, I would guess that the upper montane might start looking more than like the lower montane with climate change. To plan for the future, I might exist ambitious and manage my upper montane area to look more like my lower montane area, which we know received fire frequently in the past," explains Battaglia. The publication of GTR-373 marks an of import benchmark in Colorado Front end range woods research, which continues today with these and other studies on the past and present ecology of these forests. While restoration treatments are not expected to recreate the 1860s, the hope is that pushing the stand up construction of these forests dorsum towards past conditions, they will exist more resilient for the future.

Using historical woods stand reconstruction data to guide restoration on the Front end Range

A photo showing a fire-scarred ponderosa pine tree indicating historical surface fire with low-severity fire effects. A second photo shows a tree ring analysis, used in historical forest stand reconstruction to provide important clues about the past.

Fire-scarred ponderosa pino tree indicating historical surface burn with low-severity fire effects. Tree ring analysis, used in historical woods stand up reconstruction, provides important clues near a stand's past disturbance history. (Photo: P. Brown).

How practice you "reconstruct" a forest from the 1860s? A team of researchers (from RMRS, CFRI and Rocky Mountain Tree-Ring Research) set upward a collaborative project chosen the Front Range Woods Reconstruction Network (FRFRNet), a regional sampling effort to provide locally relevant reference conditions to guide restoration. The scientists installed one-half hectare plots (179 plots in total) throughout Forepart Range ponderosa and dry mixed-conifer forests, from Laramie, WY to Colorado Springs, CO, and looked for clues to the forests' past construction. Using tree ring analysis and signs of "old-tree" characteristics (e.yard., flat tops, large diameter branches, bark colour), they counted all trees that survived from pre-settlement times. They too looked at logs and stumps to account for the copse that used to be nowadays before harvesting. Within these large plots, they prepare smaller sub-plots to measure current tree density and they looked at fire scars to reconstruct the fire history.

From this enquiry, a clear picture of what these forests looked like 150 years ago is emerging. This reconstruction is being used to guide the desired weather for Front Range forest restoration. According to Battaglia, this research will be published in 2018 and available to managers for use in planning and implementation. A pilot report from Northern Colorado has been published and is bachelor here.

Restoration practices for the Colorado Front Range

Step 1: Identify the ecological values, restoration goals, and desired weather condition at the mural scale practices.

In one case the well-nigh important broad ecological values (e.g., wild fauna, biodiversity, and resilience to disturbances and climate change) are identified for specific landscapes, restoration goals should outline how to protect or enhance the ecological values, including: reducing the potential for broad-scale, active crown fire that results in large patches of tree mortality, enhancing landscape resilience to natural disturbances and climatic change, and increasing native biodiversity.

Step 2: Appraise the landscape conditions to identify handling needs and priorities

The three components of the assessment process described in the GTR include a electric current vegetation status assessment to place handling needs, a values at chance assessment to identify features that should be protected, and an opportunity assessment to place handling feasibility and the potential for meeting multiple objectives.

Stride 3: Develop landscape treatment plans

The GTR lists a series of "primal framing questions" for a landscape treatment plan that should lead to a more detailed landscape prescription that specifies the actual number of acres or proportion of the landscape to be treated, equally well as the distribution of treatments beyond the landscape past dissimilar handling types.

Stride iv: Define goals and desired atmospheric condition at the stand scale

Stand-level planning should focus more on stand-scale features such as groups of trees and openings. Desired weather at the stand up or treatment calibration so would depict expected proportions and spatial arrangements of dissimilar stand-calibration structural elements.

Pace v: Assess electric current weather condition at the stand up scale

Individual treatment units should be assessed to determine the management approach necessary to attain the goals and desired outcomes, most often accomplished through a pre-treatment forest inventory, which commonly includes a combination of aerial image evaluation and an on-the-footing woods inventory.

Stride vi: Develop treatment plans and prescriptions

This stride in the GTR is the most detailed, specifying the management objectives that should be included in the handling plans and prescriptions, including proportion of trees in as scattered individuals vs. groups, memory of old trees, target number of snags, and many others. It then describes the elements of the handling prescriptions, including how to become about planning density reductions and spatial distribution of trees with a focus on spatial heterogeneity.

Step 7: Monitor the trajectory of the restoration efforts

For each management objective, monitoring metrics or variables should be identified that can be measured both pre- and post-treatment in the same locations using the aforementioned methods. The GTR includes a series of questions to help managers program effective monitoring programs at both the stand and the landscape level.

Variation at fine scales creates patterns at broader scales

A graph showing low, moderate, and high density for clumped, random, or uniformed dispersion patterns.

Graph A, showing variation at fine scales. Graph B, showing variation at fine scales.

The graph'southward scale provides an important organizational framework for planning in this GTR, showtime with wide landscape assessments and so working downwardly to the fine-scale private stands or handling units. This shows the hypothetical range of variation in fine-scale (<1 acre) tree density and dispersion on Colorado Forepart Range forests. A "groupy-clumpy" stand is best represented in the lower left of the diagram, nether low-density forest atmospheric condition and clumped dispersion patterns. Openings are a mutual feature at this calibration. Variability in tree ages is represented by the different-sized green dots, with larger dots representing older trees and smaller dots representing younger trees (figure by Y. Dickinson).

Variation at fine scales (ane acre = one box) "rolls upwards" to create patterns at broader scales, driven largely past site environmental atmospheric condition and interactions with disturbance regimes. (A) Open-stand up structure likely characteristic of low-severity frequent fires where fine-calibration variation is characterized by individual trees, small-scale groups of copse, and openings. (B) Higher-density stand up structure that may develop in areas with mixed-severity burn. The college-density patches likely correspond areas of higher productivity, which may fire with moderate to loftier severity during dry weather condition. More open areas may be maintained by low-severity surface fire, or may be recovering from high-severity fire that acquired fine-scale patches of complete tree mortality. In both cases (A and B), fire exclusion would result in gradual infilling of low-density patches to create a higher-density forest status with more uniform tree dispersion (effigy by Y. Dickinson).

Visualization guide for heterogeneous woods treatments

To accost some of the challenges associated with implementing circuitous prescriptions, an effort by Colorado State University, the USFS and RMRS has produced a GTR as a companion guide to this 1 that helps managers start to envision how these prescriptions would wait. The Visualization of heterogeneous wood structures following treatment in the southern Rocky Mountains manual allows planners, implementers and contractors to "meet" what the recommended treatments may look similar at the stand level. It imagines four dissimilar treatments across four stands with varying productivity that had been identified every bit candidates for ecological restoration. The treatments include a: thin from beneath, random tree selection, moderate clumping, and high clumping prescriptions. Each treatment is paired with a graphic showing the spatial design of the residual trees and openings, traditional stand-calibration metrics, and a clarification of the fine-scale forest structure including individual copse, clumps of trees, and openings. This tool is intended to help communicate the outcomes of these complex silvicultural treatments to resource managers, contractors, specialists, and others when attempting to meet treatment objectives.

Scientist profiles

Rob Addington

A headshot of Rob Addington

ROB ADDINGTON is a Mural Ecologist with The Nature Conservancy in Colorado. He specializes in the restoration and
management of fire-adjusted forests, with emphasis on spatial planning besides equally inquiry and monitoring of forest restoration
aimed at reducing hazardous fuels, promoting landscape resilience, and enhancing ecosystem services. Rob holds an M.S.
degree in Plant Biological science from the University of Georgia. Rob worked on this General Technical Report primarily every bit a Research
Associate with the Colorado Forest Restoration Institute at Colorado State Academy.

Greg Aplet

A headshot of Greg Aplet

GREG APLET is a Senior Science Director at the Wilderness Social club, specializing in ecosystem direction and the
conservation of biological diversity and woods ecosystem health. Greg has an Thousand.Due south. in Wildland Resource Science from the
University of California, Berkeley and a Ph.D. in Forest Ecology from Colorado State University. His research includes studies
of the dynamics of Rocky Mountain and Hawaiian forests, the environmental of biological invasions, and wilderness and wildland fire
management.

Mike Battalgia

A headshot of Mike Battaglia

MIKE BATTAGLIA is a Research Forester with the USDA Forest Service's Rocky Mountain Enquiry Station lab in Fort Collins,
CO. He earned his M.S. in Forest Ecology from Virginia Tech and Ph.D in Silviculture from Colorado State University. His

research is focused on developing innovative management strategies aimed at enhancing wood resiliency to disturbance. He

works across the Interior Westward in a multifariousness of ecosystems spanning from low elevation ponderosa pine forests to subalpine

Spruce-fir forests.

Tony Cheng

A headshot of Tony Cheng

TONY CHENG is Manager of the Colorado Forest Restoration Institute and Professor of Forest & Rangeland Stewardship at
Colorado Country University, Fort Collins, Colorado. Tony has an MS in Forestry from the University of Minnesota and a PhD in
Forestry from Oregon State University. Primary research interest is in forest governance, policy and administration, with a focus

on multi-stakeholder collaborative approaches to promote resilient social-ecological systems associated with forests.

Jonas Feinstein

A headshot of Jonas Feinstein

JONAS FEINSTEIN is Country Conservation Forester for the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service in Denver, Colorado.
Jonas has a BS in Forestry from Colorado Land University and a MS in Forest Ecology and Management from Colorado State
University. He oversees NRCS Colorado's Conservation Technical Assistance program for forestry, and integrates and transfers
best bachelor science and practices into NRCS Colorado's forestry conservation practice standards and specifications.

Jeff Underhill

A headshot of Jeff Underhill

JEFF UNDERHILL is the Regional Silviculturist for the USDA Forest Service's Rocky Mountain Region. He earned his Chiliad.S in
Forestry from the Academy of Tennessee and his Thousand.Due east. in GIS from the University of Colorado at Denver. He has worked as a
timber program manager, timber direction assistant, district silviculturist, and pre-sale forester for the Us Forest Service.

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Source: https://www.fs.usda.gov/rmrs/back-future-building-resilience-colorado-front-range-forests-using-research-findings-and-new-guide