Development of a regional lichen gradient model from community data is a powerful tool to derive lichen indexes of response to environmental factors for large-scale and long-term monitoring of forest ecosystems. The Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) Program of the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service includes lichens in its national inventory of forests of the United States, to help monitor the status of forested ecosystems.

This guidebook describes Cherry Creek Research Natural Area, a 239-ha (590-ac) area that supports old-growth Douglas-fir-western hemlock (Pseudotsuga menziesii- Tsuga heterophylla) forest occurring on sedimentary materials in the southern Oregon Coast Range.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has formally declared that greenhouse gases (GHG) pose a threat to public health and the environment. This is significant because it gives the executive branch the authority to impose carbon regulations on carbon-emitting entities. United States GHG emissions have increased by approximately 17 percent between 1990 and 2007, and the EPA now has the authority to design regulation to reverse this trend.

This guidebook describes Camas Swale Research Natural Area, a 127-ha (314-ac) area that supports dry site, old-growth Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii) forest. Major plant associations present within the area include the Douglas-fir/salal/western swordfern (Pseudotsuga menziesii/Gaultheria shallon/Polystichummunitum) plant association, Douglas-fir/Oregongrape (Pseudotsuga menziesii/Berberis nervosa) plant association, Douglas-fir/poison oak (Pseudotsuga menziesii/Toxicodendron diversilobum) plant association, and Douglas-fir/hazelnut-trailing snowberry/western swordfern (Pseudotsuga menziesii/Corylus cornutavar. californica-Symphoricarpos mollis/Polystichum munitum) plant association.

Provides current information on lumber and plywood production and prices; employment in the forest industries; international trade in logs, lumber, and plywood; volume and average prices of stumpage sold by public agencies; and other related items.

A gradient-analysis-based model and grid-based map are presented that use the potential vegetation zone as the object of the model. Several new variables are presented that describe the environmental gradients of the landscape at different scales. Boundary algorithms are conceptualized, and then defined, that describe the environmental boundaries between vegetation zones on the Olympic Peninsula, Washington, USA.

The concept of ecosystem services has emerged as a way of framing and describing the comprehensive set of benefits that people receive from nature. These include commonly recognized goods like timber and fresh water, as well as processes like climate regulation and water purification, and aesthetic, spiritual, and cultural benefits. The USDA Forest Service has been exploring use of the framework of ecosystem services as a way to describe goods and services provided by federal lands and attract and build partnerships with stakeholders and nongovernmental organizations. More recently, the agency has sought place-based example applications of the ecosystem service framework to explore its possible use as a tool to guide forest management, and better illustrate the concept for policymakers, managers, and potential national forest partners.

The Forest Inventory and Analysis program collected, analyzed, and summarized field data on 73 forested field plots on the islands of Kosrae, Chuuk, Pohnpei, and Yap in the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM).

This document introduces a computer software named SNAP for ArcGIS®, which has been developed to streamline scheduling and transportation planning for timber harvest areas. Using modern optimization techniques, it can be used to spatially schedule timber harvest with consideration of harvesting costs, multiple products, alternative destinations, and transportation systems. SNAP for ArcGIS attempts either to maximize a net present value or minimize discounted costs of harvesting and transportation over the planning horizon while meeting given harvest volume and acreage constraints. SNAP for ArcGIS works in the ArcGIS environment and provides an easy-to-use analytical tool for sophisticated spatial planning of timber harvest.

The Landscape Treatment Designer (LTD) is a multicriteria spatial prioritization and optimization system to help design and explore landscape fuel treatment scenarios. The program fills a gap between fire model programs such as FlamMap, and planning systems such as ArcFuels, in the fuel treatment planning process. The LTD uses inputs on spatial treatment objectives, activity constraints, and treatment thresholds, and then identifies optimal fuel treatment locations with respect to the input parameters.

None of several types of chemotherapeutants applied before inoculation (antibiotics, metallic salts, systemic fungicides) prevented infection of sugar pine seedlings by white pine blister rust. DMSO (dimethyl sulfoxide) did not enhance the action of any material with which it was applied.

Mule deer populations in central Oregon are in decline, largely because of habitat loss. Several factors are likely contributors. Encroaching juniper and invasive cheatgrass are replacing deer forage with high nutritional value, such as bitterbrush and sagebrush. Fire suppression and reduced timber harvests mean fewer acres of early successional forest, which also offer forage opportunities. Human development, including homes and roads, is another factor. It is this one that scientists with the Pacific Northwest Research Station and their collaborators investigated in a recent study.

Scientists have had little information about how prescribed fire and cattle grazing—common practices in many Western ponderosa pine forests—affect plant abundance and reproduction in the forest understory. Pacific Northwest Research Station scientists began to explore how these practices affect vegetation in a five-year study of postfire vegetation in eastern Oregon ponderosa pine forests where cattle have been routinely pastured from late June or early July through early to mid August. For this area of eastern Oregon, they found that excluding cattle grazing during peak growing season increased native plant cover and grass flowering capability in ungrazed areas compared to grazed areas. Because vegetation was measured prior to releasing cattle on the land, the study's results tend to reflect lasting grazing impacts rather than simple consumption.

Scientists have had little information about how prescribed fire and cattle grazing—common practices in many Western ponderosa pine forests—affect plant abundance and reproduction in the forest understory. Pacific Northwest Research Station scientists began to explore how these practices affect vegetation in a five-year study of postfire vegetation in eastern Oregon ponderosa pine forests where cattle have been routinely pastured from late June or early July through early to mid August. For this area of eastern Oregon, they found that excluding cattle grazing during peak growing season increased native plant cover and grass flowering capability in ungrazed areas compared to grazed areas. Because vegetation was measured prior to releasing cattle on the land, the study's results tend to reflect lasting grazing impacts rather than simple consumption.

The U.S. Forest Service has adopted the concept and language of ecosystem services to describe the beneficial outcomes of national forest management. We review the economic theory of ecosystem services as it applies to public lands management, and consider what it implies about the types of biophysical and other data that are needed for characterizing management outcomes as changes in ecosystem services. Our intent is to provide a guide to policymakers, managers, researchers, and others for evaluating and describing the tradeoffs involved in the management of public lands. Characterizing ecosystem services fundamentally is about explaining the benefits of national forests to the American public, with an emphasis on addressing their interests and concerns about how public lands are managed. Our hope is that this report will foster dialog about what people value about national forests and how public land management agencies might best go about securing those benefits.

Nationally, there is growing public interest in and policy pressure for developing alternative and renewable sources of energy. Wind energy facilities in the Pacific Northwest expanded rapidly over the past decade, as a result of state policies that encourage wind energy development. While much of the development thus far has occurred on private lands, there is interest in expanding onto federal land. However, there are concerns about the impacts of wind energy on wildlife. Wind energy facilities have the potential to harm wildlife both directly through collisions with turbines and transmission lines, and indirectly by modifying habitat. This report synthesizes the available scientific literature on potential wind energy facility impacts to wildlife, with a focus on the Pacific Northwest (Oregon and Washington), and summarizes the current best management practices recommended in federal and state guidelines for wind energy development. Research gaps in our understanding of wind energy impacts on wildlife remain. Future research needs include long-term, multisite, experimental studies of wind energy impacts on wildlife, improved ability to estimate population-level and cumulative impacts of wind energy facilities on wildlife, and better knowledge of key wildlife species' migration and demography.

National forest managers are charged with tackling the effects of climate change on the natural resources under their care. The Forest Service National Roadmap for Responding to Climate Change and the Climate Change Performance Scorecard require managers to make significant progress in addressing climate change by 2015. To help land managers meet this challenge, Forest Service scientists conducted three case studies on national forests and adjacent national parks and documented a wide range of scientific issues and solutions. They summarized the scientific foundation for climate change adaptation and made the information accessible to land managers by creating a climate change adaptation guidebook and web portal. Case study teams discovered that collaboration among scientists and land managers is crucial to adaptation planning, as are management plans targeted to the particular ecosystem conditions and management priorities of each region.

Provides current information on lumber and plywood production and prices; employment in the forest industries; international trade in logs, lumber, and plywood; volume and average prices of stumpage sold by public agencies; and other related items.

This guidebook describes Fox Hollow Research Natural Area (RNA), a 66-ha (163-ac) area that supports dry-site Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii)–ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa) forest within the Oregon Coast Range ecoregion. Major forest plant associations represented at Fox Hollow RNA include Douglas-fir/salal/western swordfern (Pseudotsuga menziesii/Gaultheria shallon/Polystichum munitum) forest and Douglas-fir/Oregongrape (Pseudotsuga menziesii/Berberis nervosa) forest. Other forested communities are represented within the RNA in minor amounts including: Douglas-fir/poison oak (Pseudotsuga menziesii/ Toxicodendron diversilobum) forest, ponderosa pine-Douglas-fir/California fescue (Pinus ponderosa-Pseudotsuga menziesii/Festuca californica) woodland, and ponderosa pine-Douglas-fir-California black oak (Pinus ponderosa-Pseudotsuga menziesii-Quercus kelloggii) woodland.

This guidebook describes Upper Elk Meadows Research Natural Area (RNA), a 90-ha (223-ac) area that supports a mixture of coniferous forest and open, shruband herb-dominated wetlands. The major forest plant association present within Upper Elk Meadows RNA is Pacific silver fir/vine maple/coolwort foamflower (Abies amabilis/Acer circinatum-Tiarella trifoliata).

We monitored coarse woody debris dynamics and natural tree regeneration over a 14-year period after the 1991 Warner Creek Fire, a 3631-ha (8,972-ac) mixed severity fire in the western Cascade Range of Oregon. Rates for tree mortality in the fire, postfire mortality, snag fall, and snag fragmentation all showed distinct patterns by tree diameter and species, with Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii (Mirb.) Franco) more likely to survive a fire, and to remain standing as a snag, than other common tree species. Natural seedling regeneration was abundant, rapid, and highly variable in space. Densities of seedlings >10 cm height at 14 years postfire ranged from 1,530 to 392,000 per ha. Seedling establishment was not concentrated in a single year, and did not appear to be limited by the abundant growth of shrubs. The simultaneous processes of mortality, snag fall, and tree regeneration increased the variety of many measures of forest structure. The singular event of the fire has increased the structural diversity of the landscape.

This report documents the results from the first “5-year” round of understory responses to the Tongass-Wide Young-Growth Studies (TWYGS) treatments, especially in relation to their effects on food resources for black-tailed deer (Odocoileus hemionus sitkensis). Responses of understory vegetation to precommercial silviculture experiments after their first 4 to 8 years posttreatment were analyzed with the Forage Resource Evaluation System for Habitat (FRESH)-Deer model. The studies were conducted in western hemlock (Tsuga heterophylla)-Sitka spruce (Picea sitchensis) young-growth forests in southeast Alaska. All four TWYGS experiments were studied: (I) planting of red alder (Alnus rubra) within 1- to 5-year-old stands; (II) precommercial thinning at narrow and wide spacings (549 and 331 trees per hectare, respectively) in 15- to 25-year-old stands; (III) precommercial thinning at medium spacing (420 trees per hectare) with and without pruning in 25- to 35-yearold stands; and (IV) precommercial thinning at wide spacing (203 trees per hectare) with and without slash treatment versus thinning by girdling in >35-year-old stands. All experiments also included untreated control stands of identical age. FRESHDeer was used to evaluate the implications for deer habitat in terms of forage resources (species-specific biomass, digestible protein, and digestible dry matter) relative to deer metabolic requirements in summer (at two levels of requirements—maintenance only vs. lactation) and in winter (at six levels of snow depth).

Acacia koa (A. Gray), native to the Hawaiian Islands, has both cultural and economic significance. Koa wood is world-renowned for its extensive use in furniture, tone wood for musical instruments, and other items of cultural importance. Old-growth koa is decreasing in supply, yet dead and dying koa is still being harvested for manufacture of products. Knowledge of wood quality in the trees available for harvest is limited and colloquial in nature. We selected logs from four geographically dispersed sites on the Island of Hawaii. Defects on the face and end surfaces of each log were measured and photographed. The four most commonly occurring defects found were seam, branch, decay (log face), and heart rot. Sawing patterns were recorded so that corresponding defects on lumber could be measured and impact on volume recovery calculated for a specific defect. Included is a pictorial accounting that captures the defect indicators on the exterior of the log and the interior manifestation of the defects as seen in the lumber sawn from the log.

This report is a compilation of six briefing papers based on literature reviews and syntheses, prepared for U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service policy analysts and decisionmakers about specific questions pertaining to climate change.

This guidebook contains science-based principles, processes, and tools necessary to assist with developing adaptation options for national forest lands. The adaptation process is based on partnerships between local resource managers and scientists who work collaboratively to understand potential climate change effects, identify important resource issues, and develop management options that can capitalize on new opportunities and reduce deleterious effects. Because management objectives and sensitivity of resources to climate change differ among national forests, appropriate processes and tools for developing adaptation options may also differ.

Nichola Mallon said it is not possible to accommodate the backlog alongside normal business

The U.S. Forest Service's Pacific Northwest Research Station today released a new report that outlines a climate adaptation strategy for yellow-cedar in Alaska.

This guidebook describes major biological and physical attributes of the 243-ha(600-ac) North Fork Silver Creek Research Natural Area (RNA), Josephine County, Oregon.

This guidebook describes major biological and physical attributes of the 243-ha (600-ac) Round Top Butte Research Natural Area. The area supports high-quality examples of valley upland grasslands and savanna of the Cascade foothills. Plant communities include Oregon white oak (Quercus garryana) savanna and open woodland with forbs and grasses; ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa)-Oregon white oak woodland; bluebunch wheatgrass-California oatgrass-Lemmon’s needlegrass (Pseudoroegneria spicata-Danthonia californica-Achnatherum lemmonii) grasslands; and tufted hairgrass (Deschampsia cespitosa)-California oatgrass vernally flooded prairie.

The North Cascadia Adaptation Partnership (NCAP) is a science-management partnership consisting of the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service Mount Baker-Snoqualmie and Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forests and Pacific Northwest Research Station; North Cascades National Park Complex; Mount Rainier National Park; and University of Washington Climate Impacts Group.

This report addresses the need for developing consistent regional guidelines for stand-level management that integrates goals and objectives for dry forest restoration and habitat management for the northern spotted owl.

Cities have become more committed to ecological restoration and management activities in urban natural areas.

Over the past decade, wood-energy use in Alaska has grown dramatically.

Efforts to amend the Tongass National Forest Land Management Plan have necessitated the development of several management scenarios to assist with planning efforts.

This guidebook describes major biological and physical attributes of the 433-ha (1,070-ac) Grayback Glades Research Natural Area.

Forest disturbances are increasing in extent and intensity, annually altering the structure and function of affected systems across millions of acres. Land managers need rapid assessment tools that can be used to characterize disturbance events across space and to meet forest planning needs.

This guidebook describes major biological and physical attributes of the 3531-ha (8,725-ac) Fish Creek Rim Research Natural Area located within the Northern Basin and Range ecoregion and managed by the Bureau of Land Management, Lakeview District (USDI BLM 2003).

This guidebook describes major biological and physical attributes of the 155-ha (384-ac) Lost Lake Research Natural Area (RNA), in Jackson County, Oregon. The RNA has been designated because it contains examples of a landslide-dammed lake; and a low-elevation lake with aquatic beds and fringing marsh, surrounded by mixed-conifer forest (ONHAC 2010).

Outdoor recreation is a central way that people interact with the natural environment. Federal land agencies are key providers of settings, facilities, and landscapes for recreation.

The Community Biomass Handbook Volume 4: Enterprise Development for Integrated Wood Manufacturing is a guide for creating sustainable business enterprises using small diameter logs and biomass. This fourth volume is a companion to three Community Biomass Handbook volumes: Volume 1: Thermal Wood Energy; Volume 2: Alaska, Where Woody Biomass Can Work; and Volume 3: How Wood Energy is Revitalizing Rural Alaska. This volume is designed to help business partnerships, forest managers, and community groups rapidly explore and evaluate integrated manufacturing opportunities.

The 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens produced a massive landslide and consequent pyroclastic currents, deposits of which blocked the outlet to Spirit Lake. Without an outlet, the lake began to rise, threatening a breaching of the blockage and release of a massive volume of water. To mitigate the hazard posed by the rising lake and provide an outlet, in 1984–1985 the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers bored a 2.6-km (8,500-ft) long tunnel through a bedrock ridge on the western edge of the lake.

Southeast Alaska is a remote area, located approximately 700 miles north of Seattle, Washington. Most of the region’s goods are imported by barge, creating logistical and economic challenges not faced by many other parts of the United States. In this context, we used life cycle assessment (LCA) to evaluate the potential environmental impact on global warming potential (GWP) of converting home heating systems from heating oil to wood pellets in southeast Alaska. Once the current level (status quo) was established, we evaluated imported pellet utilization at 20-, 40- and 100-percent penetration into the residential heating oil markets. We also modeled local production of wood pellets in southeast Alaska, assuming a 20-percent penetration. Our research found that reductions in GWP resulting from the conversion to wood pellets ranged from 10 to 51 percent, with the greatest reductions being associated with the highest levels of imported pellets. The scenario of producing wood pellets in southeast Alaska to meet local needs had a reduction in GWP of 14 percent (versus the status quo).

Coal is the primary fuel source for electrical power generation in interior Alaska, with more than 600,000 tons burned annually at five different power plants. Woody biomass could be used as part of this fuel mix, offering potential environmental and economic benefits. In this research, debarked chips were cofired with locally mined coal at the Aurora Power Plant facility in downtown Fairbanks, Alaska. During two days of testing, aspen chips were successfully cofired with coal at average rates of 2.4 percent and 4.8 percent of total energy value. Combustion gases were analyzed during combustion of 100- percent coal, as well as at two different blends with aspen chips, for levels of carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, oxygen, and nitrogen compounds. Carbon monoxide was suggested as the combustion gas most influenced by changes in woody biomass blend rate. The potential logistic and operational challenges when cofiring were also observed. Cofiring biomass at low levels in grate-combustion systems could be performed with relative ease, with only minor impacts on plant operations, including fuel storage, handling, and performance.

In March 23-25, 2005, an international symposium on red alder was held at the University of Washington Center for Urban Horticulture in Seattle, WA. The symposium was entitled “Red Alder: A State of Knowledge” and brought together regional experts to critically examine the economic, ecological and social values of red alder. The primary goal of the symposium was to discuss new advances in the understanding of red alder biology and silviculture, changing market and nonmarket values, and the current regulatory climate for management of alder. This proceedings includes 14 papers based on oral presentations given at the symposium. These papers highlight some of the key findings from the history, ecology, biology, silviculture and economics sessions presented at the red alder symposium.

This guide presents a classification of the deep canyon and subalpine riparian and wetland vegetation types of the Malheur, Umatilla, and Wallowa-Whitman National Forests. A primary goal of the deep canyon and subalpine riparian and wetland classification was a seamless linkage with the midmontane northeastern Oregon riparian and wetland classification provided by Crowe and Clausnitzer in 1997. The classification is based on potential natural vegetation and follows directly from the plant association concept for riparian zones. The 95 vegetation types classified across the three national forests were organized into 16 vegetation series, and included some 45 vegetation types not previously classified for northeastern Oregon subalpine and deep canyon riparian and wetland environments. The riparian and wetland vegetation types developed for this guide were compared floristically and environmentally to riparian and wetland classifications in neighboring geographic regions. For each vegetation type, a section was included describing the occurrence#40;s#41; of the same or floristically similar vegetation types found in riparian and wetland classifications developed for neighboring geographic regions. Lastly, this guide was designed to be used in conjunction with the midmontane guide to provide a comprehensive look at the riparian and wetland vegetation of northeastern Oregon.

In dry, open coniferous forests of the montane West, stand-replacing wildfires and land use activities alter the composition and abundance of native grasses and forbs by degrading the habitat and accelerating the invasion of exotic annuals. On these lands, native forbs and grasses delayed or prevented from recovery by natural processes may require intervention through supplementary seeding. However, effective seeding of native plants requires that their seed traits and the potential outcome of the seeding be better understood.

Nonnative plants affect the composition and function of natural and managed ecosystems and have large economic effects through lost or degraded land use and eradication costs. In spite of their importance, very little comprehensive information on the abundance, distribution, and impact of nonnative invasive plants is available.

Transportation corridors (notably roads) affect wildlife habitat, populations, and entire ecosystems. Considerable effort has been expended to quantify direct effects of roads on wildlife populations and ecological communities and processes. Much less effort has been expended toward quantifying indirect effects. In this report, we provide a comprehensive review of road/transportation corridor ecology; in particular, how this new field of ecology has advanced worldwide. Further, we discuss how research thus far has shaped our understanding and views of the ecological implications of transportation infrastructures, and, in turn, how this has led to the current guidance, policies, and management options. We learned that the impacts of transportation infrastructures are a global issue, with the potential to affect a wide variety of taxonomically diverse species and ecosystems. Because the majority of research to date has focused on the direct and more aesthetic and anthropocentric implications of transportation corridors, mainly wildlife-vehicle collisions, it is a fairly standard practice to incorporate underpasses, green bridges (i.e., overpasses), fencing, and barriers into road corridors to alleviate such impacts. Few studies, however, have been able to demonstrate the efficiency of these structures. Furthermore, it is becoming increasingly evident that the indirect implications of transportation infrastructures (i.e., behavioral responses of wildlife individuals to roads) may be more pervasive, at least from the standpoint of biological diversity. Understanding how road corridors influence the functional connectivity of landscapes is crucial if we are to effectively manage species of concern. With these issues in mind, we propose a program of study that addresses the indirect and cumulative implications of transportation infrastructure on species distributions, community structure and ecosystem function

To increase timber production and manage other forest resource values, some land managers have undertaken logging debris and vegetation control treatments after forest harvest. We explored the roles of clearcutting on plant community composition and structure at three sites where logging debris was dispersed, piled, or removed and vegetation was annually treated or not treated with herbicides for 5 years. Without vegetation control, a competitive relation was identified between exotic and native ruderal (i.e., disturbance-associated) species. When exotic ruderal cover changed by 4 percent, native ruderal cover changed by 10 percent in the opposite direction. This relation was independent of site, but site was important in determining the overall dominance of ruderals. Five annual vegetation control treatments increased Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii (Mirb.) Franco) growth, but decreased richness and cover of other species at the rate of one species per 10 percent reduction in cover. Debris treatment effects were small and found on only one site.