Forest Sciences Commons^™

Refining Thresholds In Coupled Fire–Vegetation Models To Improve Management Of Encroaching Woody Plants In Grasslands, Dirac L. Twidwell Jr, Samuel D. Fuhlendorf, Charles A. Taylor Jr, William E. Rogers

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

1. Restoration priorities are typically established without quantitative information on how to overcome the thresholds that preclude successful restoration of desirable ecosystem properties and services. We seek to demonstrate that quantifying ecological thresholds and incorporating them into management-oriented frameworks provide a more comprehensive perspective on how the threshold concept can be applied to achieve restoration goals.

2. As an example, restoration actions have been largely unsuccessful when based on prevailing ecological knowledge of fire-based thresholds in nonresprouting Juniperus woodland. We build on previous threshold-based research and link well-established models from applied fire physics with a widely applied ecological positive feedback …