Presentation
from the 2020 annual meeting of the Ecological Society of America (ESA), which
took place online August 3-6, 2020.
Click the link above to view the recording of
this presentation.
Where and How We Plant Trees: Challenges to
Successful Reforestation and Emerging Strategies on How to Achieve It
Marin Chambers, Colorado State
University
Kyle Rodman, University of Wisconsin, Madison
Teresa Chapman, University of Colorado, Boulder
In an era of increasingly large and severe
wildfires, post-fire reforestation strategies in large high severity burn areas
experience a multitude of challenges, and can benefit from emerging strategies
to aide management decisions. Challenges for post-fire reforestation
include: low available seed or seedling stock, high moisture stress resulting
in high seedling mortality, competing natural or invasive vegetation, high
investment cost for managing agencies, safety considerations for planting
personnel, and the potential for reburning to occur following plantings.
However, spatial and operational planning
strategies and can aide managing agencies in prioritizing and optimizing
limited resources for post-fire planting while also achieving higher ecological
benefit and services in the long term. Spatial planning strategies
include: consideration of future climatic suitability for chosen planted
species, mapping size and shape of high severity burn areas to identify areas
located away from surviving trees, identifying areas known to have higher
moisture (i.e., using Topographic Wetness Index, Climate Water Deficit, Vapor
Pressure Deficit, etc. layers) or at higher elevations or on northerly aspects,
and identifying areas with coarse wood or other objects that can provide nurse
effects. Additional spatial considerations would be the consideration of
areas most beneficial to ecological services (i.e., increased connectivity of
wildlife corridors, planting for benefit for watershed services, etc.), or
utilizing topography to maximize the ability for plantings to spread seed
longer distances when trees reach reproductive maturity. Emerging
operational strategies also include: prescribe burning targeted areas ahead of
planting, utilizing drought conditioned seedlings, adopting planting strategies
that more closely mimic natural structure (i.e., legacy planting), planting in
multiple areas to increase survivability in event of future wildfires, and
timing plantings during cooler and wetter periods (i.e., during El Nino
events).
