Topographic Controls on Southern California Ecosystem Function and Post-fire Recovery PDF Download
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Author: George Azzari Publisher: ISBN: 9781321645965 Category : Languages : en Pages : 75
Book Description
Southern Californian wildfires can influence climate in a variety of ways, including changes in surface albedo, emission of greenhouse gases and aerosols, and the production of tropospheric ozone. Ecosystem post-fire recovery plays a key role in determining the strength, duration, and relative importance of these climate forcing agents. Southern California's ecosystems vary markedly with topography, creating sharp transitions with elevation, aspect, and slope. Little is known about the ways topography influences ecosystem properties and function, particularly in the context of post-fire recovery. We combined images from the USGS satellite Landsat 5 with flux tower measurements to analyze pre- and post-fire albedo and carbon exchanged by Southern California's ecosystems in the Santa Ana Mountains. We reduced the sources of external variability in Landsat images using several correction methods for topographic and bidirectional effects. We used time series of corrected images to infer the Net Ecosystem Exchange and surface albedo, and calculated the radiative forcing due to CO2 emissions and albedo changes. We analyzed the patterns of recovery and radiative forcing on north- and south-facing slopes, stratified by vegetation classes including grassland, coastal sage scrub, chaparral, and evergreen oak forest. We found that topography strongly influenced post-fire recovery and radiative forcing. Field observations are often limited by the difficulty of collecting ground validation data. Current instrumentation networks do not provide adequate spatial resolution for landscape-level analysis. The deployment of consumer-market technology could reduce the cost of near-surface measurements, allowing the installation of finer-scale instrument networks. We tested the performance of the Microsoft Kinect sensor for measuring vegetation structure. We used Kinect to acquire 3D vegetation point clouds in the field, and used these data to compute plant height, crown diameter, and volume. We found good agreement between Kinect-derived and manual measurements.
Author: George Azzari Publisher: ISBN: 9781321645965 Category : Languages : en Pages : 75
Book Description
Southern Californian wildfires can influence climate in a variety of ways, including changes in surface albedo, emission of greenhouse gases and aerosols, and the production of tropospheric ozone. Ecosystem post-fire recovery plays a key role in determining the strength, duration, and relative importance of these climate forcing agents. Southern California's ecosystems vary markedly with topography, creating sharp transitions with elevation, aspect, and slope. Little is known about the ways topography influences ecosystem properties and function, particularly in the context of post-fire recovery. We combined images from the USGS satellite Landsat 5 with flux tower measurements to analyze pre- and post-fire albedo and carbon exchanged by Southern California's ecosystems in the Santa Ana Mountains. We reduced the sources of external variability in Landsat images using several correction methods for topographic and bidirectional effects. We used time series of corrected images to infer the Net Ecosystem Exchange and surface albedo, and calculated the radiative forcing due to CO2 emissions and albedo changes. We analyzed the patterns of recovery and radiative forcing on north- and south-facing slopes, stratified by vegetation classes including grassland, coastal sage scrub, chaparral, and evergreen oak forest. We found that topography strongly influenced post-fire recovery and radiative forcing. Field observations are often limited by the difficulty of collecting ground validation data. Current instrumentation networks do not provide adequate spatial resolution for landscape-level analysis. The deployment of consumer-market technology could reduce the cost of near-surface measurements, allowing the installation of finer-scale instrument networks. We tested the performance of the Microsoft Kinect sensor for measuring vegetation structure. We used Kinect to acquire 3D vegetation point clouds in the field, and used these data to compute plant height, crown diameter, and volume. We found good agreement between Kinect-derived and manual measurements.
Author: Harold Mooney Publisher: Univ of California Press ISBN: 0520278801 Category : Nature Languages : en Pages : 1008
Book Description
This long-anticipated reference and sourcebook for CaliforniaÕs remarkable ecological abundance provides an integrated assessment of each major ecosystem typeÑits distribution, structure, function, and management. A comprehensive synthesis of our knowledge about this biologically diverse state, Ecosystems of California covers the state from oceans to mountaintops using multiple lenses: past and present, flora and fauna, aquatic and terrestrial, natural and managed. Each chapter evaluates natural processes for a specific ecosystem, describes drivers of change, and discusses how that ecosystem may be altered in the future. This book also explores the drivers of CaliforniaÕs ecological patterns and the history of the stateÕs various ecosystems, outlining how the challenges of climate change and invasive species and opportunities for regulation and stewardship could potentially affect the stateÕs ecosystems. The text explicitly incorporates both human impacts and conservation and restoration efforts and shows how ecosystems support human well-being. Edited by two esteemed ecosystem ecologists and with overviews by leading experts on each ecosystem, this definitive work will be indispensable for natural resource management and conservation professionals as well as for undergraduate or graduate students of CaliforniaÕs environment and curious naturalists.
Author: Neil G. Sugihara Publisher: Univ of California Press ISBN: 0520246055 Category : Business & Economics Languages : en Pages : 613
Book Description
Focusing on California and issues specific to fire ecology and management in the state's bioregions, this work provides scientific information for use in land restoration and other management decisions made in the field. It introduces the basics of fire ecology, and includes an overview of fire, vegetation and climate in California; and more.
Author: Publisher: ISBN: Category : Electronic books Languages : en Pages : 101
Book Description
errestrial vegetation growth, climate variation, and fire activity have been strongly coupled since the advent of vascular plants approximately 420 million years before present. Rises in anthropogenic land cover transformation, invasive species propagation, carbon emission, and artificial sources of fire ignition in recent centuries have greatly affected terrestrial plant communities. The populous, semi-arid region of southern California is marked by heightened fire activity and extreme drought episodes in recent decades. Contemporary regimes (spatial-temporal patterns) of fire and drought may exceed historical ranges of variability and thus threaten native plant communities, which may have adapted to quite different disturbance regimes. Postfire recovery of southern California shrub species (chaparral) may be impeded by fires that recur at short intervals or by severe drought. Evaluating the response of chaparral to compound fire-drought effects is key in conservation planning under projected climate, land use, and fire regime scenarios. Time-sequential remote sensing based on Landsat satellite imagery is a useful way to characterize shrub cover change over regional extents and several decades, and may provide a broader perspective than much of the ecological and biogeographic literature, which is mostly based on field studies. Landscape-scale variations of shrub type, soil reflectance, and terrain may introduce spatial bias into signals of change in fractional shrub cover (FSC) based on spectral vegetation indices (SVIs), including Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI). Chapter 2 evaluates these potential error sources in the application of postfire recovery assessment based on Landsat image series. Chapter 2 is based on three chaparral landscapes having internally-varied postfire recovery trajectories, and involves a cross-stratification variable-control approach. Results show that differences in shrub type linked to biomass variations can significantly influence linear NDVI-FSC relations, and such effects are accentuated in postfire recovery metrics based on NDVI difference. Minor effects due to soil spectral reflectance differences were observed at one site, but no significant effect of terrain illumination variability was found. Insights from Chapter 2 guided the methodologies of Chapters 3 and 4, which evaluate regional-scale influences of repeated fire and of drought on chaparral recovery, respectively. A regional map of change in FSC between the periods 1984–1989 and 2014–2018 was derived by transforming Landsat NDVI trajectories into calibrated estimates of FSC within 49 manually-delineated portions of the regional chaparral community, based on detailed shrub cover maps derived from high spatial resolution aerial imagery. Postfire recovery patterns were evaluated in 246 areas which burned in the period 1985–2008 and represent varied numbers of burns (one to three) and fire return intervals (1 to 23 years). Fire-return interval was not significantly related to recovery, except at sites that had burned three times within 25 years. Mean precipitation, soil hydrologic properties, and chaparral community type were significant predictors of recovery in the region. Limited postfire recovery was most acute in transmontane ecotonal chamise sites bounding the Colorado Desert. Chapter 4 addresses the influence of drought on postfire chaparral recovery in montane, cismontane and transmontane areas of southern California (deemed as climate zones). I evaluated drought based on summer (June–August) and wet-season (November–May) aggregates of precipitation, Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI) and climatic water deficit (CWD), in years preceding and following fire events. Only prefire drought was significant in postfire recovery of montane chaparral. Drought before and in the first and second wet seasons after fire were significant controls on recovery in the other climate zones. High-elevation transmontane chamise sites most impacted by drought (with spatially variable recovery patterns) were selected to evaluate landscape-level predictors of recovery. Elevation, soil permeability, chaparral community type, and FSC-normalized Landsat Visible Atmospherically-Resistant Index (VARI) were significant predictors of landscape-scale variation of recovery under drought impact (R2 = 0.53). Based on twelve proximal (once-burned) chaparral stands that exhibited varied recoveries, I found that high CWD in immediate-postfire and several prefire wet seasons explained ~42 percent of recovery variation. The results of this work suggest that drought effects on resprouting vigor or fire intensity are limiting factors of postfire chaparral recovery in southern California. This dissertation represents the most temporally- and spatially-extensive assessment of postfire chaparral recovery yet conducted, providing insights (regarding the importance of drought versus frequent fire in recovery) which may help to inform land management and conservation efforts in the region. This work has also advanced the technical application of time-sequential satellite imagery and spatial analysis in the study of ecological change, and may segue to greater advancements in vegetation monitoring and ecological theory.
Author: Emma C. Underwood Publisher: Springer ISBN: 3319683039 Category : Technology & Engineering Languages : en Pages : 483
Book Description
Chaparral shrubland ecosystems are an iconic feature of the California landscape, and a highly biodiverse yet highly flammable backdrop to some of the fastest growing urban areas in the United States. Chaparral-type ecosystems are a common element of all of the world’s Mediterranean-type climate regions – of which California is one – yet there is little public appreciation of the intrinsic value and the ecosystem services that these landscapes provide. Valuing Chaparral is a compendium of contributions from experts in chaparral ecology and management, with a focus on the human relationship with chaparral ecosystems. Chapters cover a wide variety of subjects, ranging from biodiversity to ecosystem services like water provision, erosion control, carbon sequestration and recreation; from the history of human interactions with chaparral to current education and conservation efforts; and from chaparral restoration and management to scenarios of the future under changing climate, land use, and human population. Valuing Chaparral will be of interest to resource managers, the research community, policy makers, and the public who live and work in the chaparral dominated landscapes of California and other Mediterranean-type climate regions.
Author: A Cerda Publisher: CRC Press ISBN: 1439843333 Category : Science Languages : en Pages : 630
Book Description
This book has been published a decade after Fires Effects on Ecosystems by DeBano, Neary, and Folliott (1998), and builds on their foundation to update knowledge on natural post-fire processes and describe the use and effectiveness of various restoration strategies that may be applied when human intervention is warranted. The chapters in this book,
Author: Paulo Pereira Publisher: CSIRO PUBLISHING ISBN: 1486308155 Category : Science Languages : en Pages : 400
Book Description
Wildland fires are occurring more frequently and affecting more of Earth's surface than ever before. These fires affect the properties of soils and the processes by which they form, but the nature of these impacts has not been well understood. Given that healthy soil is necessary to sustain biodiversity, ecosystems and agriculture, the impact of fire on soil is a vital field of research. Fire Effects on Soil Properties brings together current research on the effects of fire on the physical, biological and chemical properties of soil. Written by over 60 international experts in the field, it includes examples from fire-prone areas across the world, dealing with ash, meso and macrofauna, smouldering fires, recurrent fires and management of fire-affected soils. It also describes current best practice methodologies for research and monitoring of fire effects and new methodologies for future research. This is the first time information on this topic has been presented in a single volume and the book will be an important reference for students, practitioners, managers and academics interested in the effects of fire on ecosystems, including soil scientists, geologists, forestry researchers and environmentalists.
Author: Jose Moreno Publisher: Springer ISBN: 9781461286905 Category : Science Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
Regions with Mediterranean-type climates include parts of California, South America, Australia, and of course, Europe. The effect of global climate change on these heavily populated areas will have major social and political ramifications. This volume addresses issues in these areas, from processes at the leaf level to the individual, ecosystem, and landscape levels. This book will serve to raise awareness on the significance of these types of ecosystems, and on their sensitivity to the threat that global change represents.
Author: Francisco Moreira Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media ISBN: 9400722087 Category : Technology & Engineering Languages : en Pages : 333
Book Description
In spite of all the efforts made in fire prevention and suppression, every year about 45 000 forest fires occur in Europe, burning ca. 0.5 million hectares of forests and other rural lands. The management of these burned forests has been given much less attention than fire prevention or fire suppression issues, but the post-fire management of burned areas raises strong concerns (economic and social impacts, soil erosion and water quality, biodiversity loss, forest restoration). Although there are a few publications which address post-fire management, the focus of these has been either on general approaches to restoration or specific topics such as preventing post-fire soil erosion. This book is about the post-fire management of fire-prone forest types in southern Europe. It provides the first comprehensive overview of the topic, ranging from stand-level to landscape-level management, and from emergency actions to long-term restoration approaches.
Author: George Azzari
Author: George Azzari
Author: Harold Mooney
Author: Neil G. Sugihara
Author: 
Author: Emma C. Underwood
Author: A Cerda
Author: Paulo Pereira
Author: Jose Moreno
Author: Joan L. Florsheim
Author: Francisco Moreira