Organized Oral Session
Hybrid Session
Tyler Hoecker
University of Montana, United States
Reetam Majumder
North Carolina State University, United States
The patterns and characteristics of fire and fire regimes are being altered by climate change across the US. This creates longer and hotter fire seasons that have increasingly large impacts on communities and on the environment. Climate-driven changes in fire regimes are interacting with the legacies of fire suppression as well as the historical criminalization of Indigenous burning to further alter contemporary fire activity and ecosystem responses. The effects of changing fire dynamics vary across regions, and create significant challenges for natural resource managers in their attempts to anticipate and adapt to potential futures. The inaugural cohort of Climate Adaptation Postdoctoral Fellows, supported by the USGS National Climate Adaptation Science Center, have been engaged in co-producing actionable science with regional communities of fire practice as well as synthesizing knowledge around the “Future of Fire” at the national scale. With recognition that many systems are becoming increasingly fire-prone under climate change, this session will present the state of the science in regard to fire management at regional and national scales, and discuss new pathways to adaptation under future fire regimes.
The regional differences in the drivers of fire across the United States motivate the idea of fire-use ‘decision spaces’: multivariate sets of sociocultural, ecological, climatological factors that constrain the options and decisions of practitioners in their particular contexts. Through vignettes of fire-use cases focusing on prescribed fires, wildland fire management, and cultural burning, we address the question: How are the sociocultural and biophysical contexts for fire stewardship being affected by climate change? The vignettes characterize where and how the decision spaces for the different communities of fire practice overlap, and how they are expected to change in the future. The session serves to synthesize climate change impacts on fire regimes, management, and response over regional and national scales, and provide a discussion on potential strategies to help managers adapt to these changes.
Presenting Author: Tyler Hoecker – University of Montana
Co-author: Sean Parks – USDA Forest Service Aldo Leopold Wilderness Research Institute, Rocky Mountain Research Station, US Forest Service
Co-author: Meade Krosby, Director of the Northwest Climate Adaptation Science Center – University of Washington
Co-author: Solomon Dobrowski – Dept. Forest Management, University of Montana
Presenting Author: Jilmarie J. Stephens – University of Colorado-Boulder
Co-author: Maxwell Joseph – Natural Capital Exchange
Co-author: Virginia Iglesias – University of Colorado Boulder
Co-author: Ty Tuff, n/a – Environmental Data Science Innovation and Inclusion Lab
Co-author: Adam L. Mahood – USDA-ARS
Co-author: Imtiaz Rangwala – North Central Climate Adaptation Science Center
Co-author: Jane Wolken – North Central Climate Adaptation Science Center
Co-author: Jennifer K. Balch – CIRES/Earth Lab, University of Colorado Boulder
Presenting Author: Alyssa Anderson – University of Hawaii at Manoa
Co-author: Susan Cordell – USFS Institute of Pacific Islands Forestry
Co-author: Abby Frazier – Clark University
Co-author: Christian Giardina – USFS Institute of Pacific Islands Forestry
Co-author: Mari-Vaughn Johnson – USGS, Pacific Island Climate Adaptation Science Center
Co-author: Creighton Litton – University of Hawaii at Manoa
Co-author: Clay Trauernicht – University of Hawaii at Manoa
Presenting Author: Aaron Russell – University of Oklahoma
Presenting Author: Nina Fontana, Ph.D. – University of California-Davis/Southwest Climate Adaptation Science Center