Drought and insect outbreaks alter fuel and potential fire behavior in two California forest types
/Interacting disturbances have increasingly come to shape stand structure and fuel characteristics in seasonally dry western forests. Between 2012 and 2016, concurrent multi-year drought and outbreaks of western pine beetle, fir engraver beetle, and pinyon ips resulted in the mortality of an estimated 147 million trees across California’s forests, with central and southern California being most impacted. Peak tree mortality occurred between 2015 and 2016, leading researchers to investigate changes in stand structure, fuel loading, and fire behavior in the four following years (2015-2019). Data collection occurred in forested plot networks in the Los Padres (LPF) and Sierra National Forests (SNF). Southern plots (all on the LPF) were pinyon pine and canyon live oak-dominated, while northern plots (SNF) were mixed-conifer, including ponderosa, lodgepole, and sugar pine, incense cedar, black oak, and white and red fir at higher elevation sites. Both forest types have experienced densification as a result of fire suppression over the past two centuries, leading to standing fuel continuity that, when combined with heavy, dry surface fuel loads and appropriate weather conditions, could produce severe fire behavior.
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Reed, Charlotte C., Sharon M. Hood, Daniel R. Cluck, and Sheri L. Smith. 2023. “Fuels Change Quickly after California Drought and Bark Beetle Outbreaks with Implications for Potential Fire Behavior and Emissions.” Fire Ecology 19 (1): 16. doi:10.1186/s42408-023-00175-6.
