Oct 13th Field Trip Make-Up Assignment
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University of California, Berkeley *
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Course
185
Subject
Geography
Date
Dec 6, 2023
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docx
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4
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Name________________________________
ESPM 185: Oct 13
th
Field Trip Make-Up Assignment
*this make-up assignment is only for students who missed the October 13
th
field trip to Blodgett and did not complete the Redwood field trip make-up assignment.
PART 1: FIRES AND OLD GROWTH FORESTS
Section 1.1. Read the paper “Defining old growth for fire-adapted forests of the western United States” (available at http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol12/iss2/art15/
) and answer the following questions.
Question 1a.
Why is it impossible (and not recommended) to develop one standard definition of old growth for all forest types? Question 1b.
How do old growth characteristics vary between forests that historically experienced infrequent, high-severity fires versus forests that historically experienced frequent, low- to mixed-
severity fires? Question 1c. What are the three spatial scales of old-growth in frequent-fire forests as described by the authors? Be sure to use your own words (i.e., do not plagiarize). Question 1d.
What are key differences in the historical fire regime for ponderosa pine forests of the Southwest and ponderosa pine forests of the Colorado Front Range? How do these difference influence characteristics of old-growth in ponderosa pine forests in these regions? (hint—the information you need to answer this question is in table 2B and the narratives on pages 11-13)
Section 1.2.
Dr. Bill Romme mapped the year when stands of lodgepole pine originated across a large portion of Yellowstone National Park. Lodgepole pine forests typically experience infrequent (every 200-
400 years), high-severity fires. The image below shows stand ages for the year 1778. Numbers refer to community types (see legend below), and numbers in parentheses are stand ages (i.e., years since stand-
replace fire). Use this image to answer questions 2a and 2b.
Question 2a. Describe three factors that might account for the shape of stand boundaries.
Question 2b. Does it look like any areas burned from 1770-1778? How do you know?
Section 1.3. Dr. Bill Romme used information on stand ages and distributions (like in the image for part 2) to calculate the occurrence of fire at different times and the abundance of old growth in Yellowstone National Park (table 1). Use this table to answer questions 3b, 3d, and 3e.
Question 3a. Does the traditional definition of old-growth (undisturbed forests with many old trees, abundant dead woody material, and multiple canopy layers) make sense for lodgepole pine forests? Why
or why not? Question 3b. Use table 1 to calculate the percentage of area burned each century (hint: sum all values), and then calculate the natural fire rotation (NFR)
1
for that century using the equation below:
NFR = time period / (% burned / 100)
1
Nat
u
ral fire rotation
= the number of years expected between fires occurring on the exact same location in an area, or the number of years expected for the entire area to burn at least once Question 3c. What are three reasons that natural fire rotation might vary from century to century? Question 3d. How unusual do you think the 1988 Yellowstone Fire was in light of data in table 1? Why? PART 2: After looking through the field trip photo guide, what are three things that you learned about managing mixed-conifer forests and/or reforestation efforts. Each topic learned, should be a short paragraph.
Table 1. Percentage of area burned and percentage of area in old growth (> 300 years old for dry sites and >400 years old for mesic sites).
Period
% of area burned
% of area in old growth
1700-1720
20
70
1721-1740
5
45
1741-1760
14
40
1761-1780
1
40
1781-1800
2
40
1800-1820
5
23
1821-1840
1
24
1841-1860
3
25
1861-1880
8
28
1881-1900
5
30
1900-1920
5
32
1921-1940
0
35
1941-1960
2
37
1961-1980
0
40
1981-1990
27
40
Century
Total % area burned
Natural fire rotation (years)
1700-1800
1800-1900
1900-1990
Average
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