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Full-Text Articles in Forest Sciences

Designing A Serious Game To Simulate Ecological Processes On A Post-Eruption Mount St. Helens Landscape, Parker Maynard May 2024

Designing A Serious Game To Simulate Ecological Processes On A Post-Eruption Mount St. Helens Landscape, Parker Maynard

Masters Theses

Developing strategies to successfully manage landscapes to meet ecological, economic, and social goals is an increasing concern in a world experiencing anthropogenic global changes. The 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens in Washington state provided a major learning opportunity in managing resource effectively after a major disturbance. This information is explored through Resilience: After The Eruption: a serious game developed as part of this thesis that synthesizes research about ecological recovery and resource management following the eruption of Mount St. Helens. The digital game allows players to take on the role of four different stakeholders performing landscape-based operations while …


Automated Tree Mortality Detection Using Ubiquitously Available Public Data, Michael T. Huggins Mar 2024

Automated Tree Mortality Detection Using Ubiquitously Available Public Data, Michael T. Huggins

Master's Theses

Understanding the dynamic interplay between fire severity, topography, and tree mortality, is crucial for predicting future forest dynamics and enhancing resilience against climate change-induced wildfire regimes. This thesis develops a multi-sensor approach for automated estimation of tree mortality, then applies it to examine trends in tree mortality over a six-year period across a fire affected study site in the Trinity River basin in Northern California. The Random Forest model uses publicly available USGS 3D Elevation Program Lidar (3DEP) and NAIP imagery as inputs and is likely to be easily adaptable to other landscapes. The model had a Receiver Operating Characteristic …


Post-Fire Persistance Of Sequoia Semperviens In A Secondary Forest: Examining Drivers Of Basal Resprouting Response, Jackson T. Carrasco Jan 2024

Post-Fire Persistance Of Sequoia Semperviens In A Secondary Forest: Examining Drivers Of Basal Resprouting Response, Jackson T. Carrasco

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Historically frequent-fire forest ecosystems are now facing increased size, frequency, and severity of fires attributed to climate change, intensive forest management, and fire exclusion. Understanding post-fire resilience in forest ecosystems is critical amidst escalating challenges posed by recent increases in fire activity. This study examined the basal resprouting response of coast redwood (Sequoia sempervirens) in a secondary forest two years after the CZU Lightning Complex fire on the central coast of California. Robust allometric equations were developed to quantify redwood resprout biomass and leaf area, revealing strong explanatory power for biomass equations (R² > 0.85). Probability of …


Environmental Biology Masters Capstone, Antonio Gonzalez-Pita Jan 2024

Environmental Biology Masters Capstone, Antonio Gonzalez-Pita

Regis University Student Publications (comprehensive collection)

Human wildlife interactions (HWI) pose a complex challenge for wildlife managers. Human encroachment into wildlife habitat and the growing number of outdoor recreationists are increasing the frequency of contact and conflict, especially in regions such as the Front Range of Colorado. Geographic information systems (GIS), which use a combination of remote sensing and environmental survey data, allow for predictive spatial analyses of where human wildlife interactions are likely to occur. I used publicly reported observations of moose to create spatial predictive maps in a species distribution model framework. Slope and elevation were shown to be the strongest predictors of HWI, …