Fire Ecology Annual Report, Southern Utah Group Fire Effects Monitoring Program: Calendar Year 2006

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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). Its graduation time here in the Southern Utah Group Fire Effects Monitoring Program. Lead Monitor Claire Crow is in the process of graduating from the University of Arizona with a Masters in Wildlife Management and Conservation and will be returning to Zion National Park as the Wildlife Biologist. Assistant Lead Alina Cansler graduated to Lead Fire Effects Monitor for North Cascades National Park near the end of the season. And finally, Katie Johnson stepped up from crewmember to Zion Fire Effects Lead. Minus the change in staffing, this year’s field season was uneventful. Three parks remain in the Southern Utah Group program and provided for a sufficient workload. With the East Mesa unit in Zion National Park being the only prescribed fire of the season, the majority of the reads were Post-Burns and Re-Pre’s. More than half the field time was spent at Bryce Canyon National Park, mainly due to dodging lightning strikes and downpours. In between trips to Bryce, a brief trip to Golden Spike National Historic Site was made for three FMH brush plots. This year’s field data was entered in it’s entirety into FMH, even though all previous data had been converted into FEAT. Li Brannfors from Grand Canyon National Park detailed in and assisted with the final conversion from FMH to FEAT 2.4. FEAT will be in working order and ready for analysis and data entry in the spring. The Kolob fire in June/July, which burned over 10,000 acres of climax pinyon/juniper community in Zion National Park, kept Kelly, the Fire Ecologist, busy as the Resource Advisor for the fire. The 10 day ordeal involved briefing the Incident Command Team and field crews, coordinating with other ZNP field resource advisors, consulting on suppression actions, and post fire rehab planning. A NPS Intermountain Region BAER team was called in on July 16th to assess the natural and cultural resource damage and make recommendations to the park for rehab actions. As soon as the BAER team departed, the task of implementing recommendations and coordinating contracts began. When selected rehab actions were completed in November, 3.7 miles of fence were replaced, 493 acres were aerially seeded and herbicide was aerially applied to over 8000 acres of the park. This application of herbicide is the largest in NPS history and was accomplished to prevent the conversion of the juniper/pinyon community to an annual exotic grass (Bromus tectorum). This treatment will be followed up with 3 years of monitoring to determine its effectiveness. The Fire Ecologist also served as the Acting Chief of Resources beginning in November.

Fire Ecology Annual Report, Southern Utah Group Fire Effects Monitoring Program: Calendar Year 2006

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