1998 Grand Canyon Prescribed Fire Annual Summary

Prescribed Fire Staff

The 1998 Prescribed Fire Annual Summary is broken into two parts (prescribed fire operations and fire monitoring summary). Prescribed Fire Operations The purpose of this report is to have documentation of accomplishment and other activities to aid Fire Program Managers in decisions and program development at Grand Canyon National Park. Fire Monitoring Summary This annual report serves as a summary of Fire Monitoring program activities as well as an analysis of fire monitoring information collected as of December 31, 1998. The first half of the report details crew activities and accomplishments, explains the plot network, and outlines changes in plot protocols. Crew members were involved in many out-of-park and in-park fire assignments, including the North Rim Complex, Topeka prescribed burn, Lonetree prescribed burn, Walhalla prescribed burn at Grand Canyon, and Chimenea prescribed burn at Saguaro National Park. The crew of four made 35 plot visits in 1998 and checked 9 additional sites for future inclusion in monitoring types. Minor changes were made in protocols to ensure the data are gathered in the best possible manner. The most important conclusion concerning crew members is the fact that they need more training in the Fire Monitoring protocols in order to collect data properly and avoid costly mistakes that may not be noticed until data are analyzed years later. The second half of the report summarizes monitoring results and ties them directly to prescribed fire objectives by monitoring type. Table 10 on page 44 provides a brief summary of whether or not each objective has been met by monitoring type. However, use caution when interpreting this table to assess the overall success of the prescribed fire program. Some factors cannot be analyzed with much accuracy until more plots are added to the analysis. Other factors will never be analyzed with the desired confidence as the number of plots needed would be prohibitive in cost. The tables and graphs provided in the analysis section of this report should be studied carefully in order to fully assess how well prescribed fire objectives are being met. Additional statistical software is needed in order to ascertain if a real change has occurred in many instances. Such details are provided in the text of the analysis section. As plots are added to the network and postburn data are gathered in 1999, more accurate information will be available to prescribed fire and resource managers at Grand Canyon National Park.

1998 Grand Canyon Prescribed Fire Annual Summary

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