Estimating the influence of field inventory sampling intensity on forest landscape model performance for determining high-severity wildfire risk.

ABSTRACT: Historically, fire has been essential in Southwestern US forests. However, a century of fire-exclusion and changing climate created forests which are more susceptible to uncharacteristically severe wildfires. Forest managers use a combination of thinning and prescribed burning to reduce forest density to help mitigate the risk of high-severity fires. These treatments are laborious and expensive, therefore optimizing their impact is crucial. Landscape simulation models can be useful in identifying high risk areas and assessing treatment effects, but uncertainties in these models can limit their utility in decision making. In this study we examined underlying uncertainties in the initial vegetation layer by leveraging a previous study from the Santa Fe fireshed and using new inventory plots

SUBMITTER: Hecht H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10847129 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature