Fire Ecology Annual Report: Calendar Year 2013 [Northern Great Plains]

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A summary of fire ecology activities and program information for the Park/network including fire effects plot workload, staffing, management objectives and monitoring results, and planning, fire monitoring, communications, and research. Also included are staff accomplishments/areas of focus, future program direction and other optional information (e.g. data analysis graphics or presentations, annual highlights, publications, program challenges, unique solutions to problems, collaboration, photographs of monitoring/fire activities, and suggestions on FFI). 2013 was a productive year for the Northern Great Plains (NGP) fire ecology program. A total of 118 plots of various types were measured in nine park units, which included 51 installs in five park units. One prescribed fire which burned 4 plots, occurred in the NGP parks and these were measured immediately post-burn. Severe to exceptional drought enveloped all of the Northern Great Plains over the winter into early spring. A wetter weather pattern came to the region in April with a series of three major winter storms that blanketed western SD and the NE panhandle. The drought intensity and extent moderated from north to south from spring to fall as a wetter than normal moisture regime took continued. Plot monitoring in area parks indicated that the mixed-grass prairie ecosystem showed a positive vegetative response to the increase in precipitation and associated soil moisture. According to the U.S. Drought Monitor, by early November all Northern Great Plains parks were drought-free with the exception of Agate Fossil Beds N.M. and Scotts Bluff N.M. which were unusually dry. This was the fourth field season in which the NGP fire ecology program collaborated with the Northern Great Plains Inventory and Monitoring Network (NGPN). The NGP fire effects crew and NGPN installed and read fifty-five upland forest, tall shrub, target invasive, and fuels plots and twenty riparian lowland plots at Devils Tower N.M. this summer which are spatially balanced throughout the park. The NGP fire ecology program continues to collaborate with the NGP I&M program in botany/field protocol training, field monitoring, and FFI database management. We continue to coordinate plot sampling visits as much as possible throughout our park network since both programs are using the same sampling design and monitoring protocols. Due to cuts in fuels funding this fiscal year, this was the first field season in which the NGP fire ecology program was cut in seasonal pay periods. As a result, the NGP fire ecology program collaborated with the Black Hills fire use module and Wind Cave engine crew throughout the summer to bolster each other’s programs during their critical work-load periods. Our lead monitor went out to the Snake Complex in WY for two weeks with the Black Hills module and also was an engine boss (T) on a Wind Cave N.P. engine for two weeks at the Standing Rock reservation in SD/ND. The assistant fire use module leader helped our fire effects crew read monitoring plots for one week at DETO and two Wind Cave N.P. crewmembers helped with data entry for a couple of days.

Fire Ecology Annual Report: Calendar Year 2013 [Northern Great Plains]

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