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January 2016
Review / Preview

 
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LANDFIRE Bulletin
Review / Preview Edition

Janus is the Roman god of beginnings and endings and is the namesake for the month of January. He is depicted with two faces, one looking at the past, the other to the future. In that spirit, LANDFIRE (LF) reviews 2015 highlights and notes what's coming in 2016.
 

Review

  • Henry Bastian writes about partnerships and collaboration.
  • Steve Zahn notes the completion and delivery of LF 2012
  • Jim Smith writes about the CONUS Auto-Key Improvement project


Preview

  • Frank Fay looks at an engagement opportunity
  • Jim Smith covers the review/update of LF BpS Models and Descriptions, and automating the LF EVT agreement assessment process
  • Steve Zahn previews LF 2014
  • Jeannie Patton provides a webinar schedule


1st Quarter Webinars
 

January 19 - Management applications of the LANDFIRE Biophysical Settings models in the California National Forests presented by Hugh Safford, USFS Regional Ecologist for the Pacific Southwest. 

January 20BpS Review: What is it? How does it work? Why does it matter? presented by ecologist Randy Swaty, TNC-LANDFIRE. 

February 2 - Demystifying LANDFIRE’s Biophysical Settings Descriptions and Models presented by fire ecologist Kori Blankenship, TNC-LANDFIRE. 
February 18 --
BpS Review in the Pacific Northwest: What is it? How does it work? Why does it matter? Kori presents; registration details coming.

Early March (date tbd) – The Biophysical Settings and Historic Fire Regimes of the North Atlantic presented by Randy Swaty.

Northern Rockies webinar is in the works.

Contact Us
Henry Bastian
DOI Business Lead
Frank Fay
USFS Business Lead
Don Long
Technical Lead

Kurtis Nelson
Technical Lead
Jim Smith
TNC-LF Project Lead
Steve Zahn
LF Project Manager


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LF's newest "Short" features Henry Bastian and Frank Fay talking about partnerships and MOUs. Watch it on YouTube

Have a webinar idea? Tell us. We will help develop and publicize it, and bring in a partner to co-host when possible.


 


2015 Review

Partnerships

The first intra-agency agreement (2005) between Forest Inventory Analysis Program (FIA) and LANDFIRE continues to be renewed because of continued mutual interests and benefits pertaining to renewable forest resources. In 2015, both the Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) National Resource Inventory (NRI) and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Assessment Inventory & Monitoring data entered into agreements with LF to similarly share data. This collaboration improves data products, providing opportunities for comparative analyses (processes, vegetation types, structure analysis, etc.) modeled results, with both qualitative and quantitative assessments.  More on partnerships. List of partners. Watch the Short.


Collaboration

LANDFIRE supports the three national goals of the Wildland Fire Management Cohesive Strategy and is a key data set that identifies opportunities to reduce wildfire risks and establish national priorities. As part of the Cohesive Strategy, we provided data to support a landscape classification to help develop national priority maps for broad scale fuels management, community planning and coordination, and for managing human-caused fires. LF landcover and fire regimes data informed the nature and characteristics of U.S. counties relative to the nature of fire which helped researchers develop an informative, general, national narrative.

Completion, Delivery of LF 2012

In April 2015, LANDFIRE released LF 2012, the latest in a series of biennial updates to the LF National product suite. LF 2012 focused on changes for 2011 and 2012. Highlights include

  1. Using Remote Sensing of Landscape Change (RSLC) methods to map disturbance in Hawai’i.
  2. Providing Gap Fill to ameliorate the effects of scan line errors in Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (MTBS) and Rapid Assessment of Vegetation Condition after Wildfire (RAVG) disturbance products.
  3. Adding CBH Regression Tree Analysis (RTA) capability to the LANDFIRE Total Fuel Change (LFTFC) tool.

Improvement of LANDFIRE Auto-Keys

Effective image-based mapping processes are based on reliable and extensive ground information. Because LANDFIRE uses hundreds of thousands of geo-referenced vegetation plots from various sources, we have utilized a regionally-based automated process, Auto-Keys, to consistently assign current vegetation labels to every plot. Over the last five years, we evaluated and improved the quality and usefulness of our Auto-Keys. While the Alaska, Hawai’i, and insular areas are still in process, the improvement is complete for the Lower 48 states and will be used to label plots that are submitted during the current data call (deadline March 31, 2016).

Click here for
more on Auto-Keys.  You will find a number of documents with key information about the reports and how to use them, as well as a contrived example showing how to apply information to a specific area of interest.

2016 Preview

Engagement Opportunity: Remap

LANDFIRE is beginning a Remap project to update the base layers of data, providing an opportunity to revisit some underlying assumptions that help inform the base map. Please help us examine some of the nuts and bolts behind the data. We are starting several mini-project teams that will address questions, such as

  1. Can fire behavior fuel model (FBFM) guidebooks improve the translation from existing vegetation to fire behavior fuel model?
  2. Can we build regionally specific data to address the dynamic nature of fuels?
  3. What can we learn from the way people use LF data in the Wildfire Decision Support System (WFDSS)?
For more information click here: LANDFIRE Engagement Opportunities.

Engagement Opportunity: BpS Review/Update

In 2016, the TNC LANDFIRE Team will be coordinating a review and update of all LF Biophysical Settings (BpS) state-and-transition models and descriptions. The review is the first complete update since they were developed and delivered between 2005-2009. LF is committed to a collaborative process; incorporating the knowledge and experience of experts in fields of vegetation and fire ecology is critical. Help update and improve this important encyclopedia of scientific knowledge. Share what you know, and pass this request to others who can provide their expertise as well. Reviews received by July 1, 2016 will be used in the LF Remap process. Click on the BpS review website for information and contacts.

LANDFIRE 2014

By the end of 2016, LANDFIRE will have completed LF 2014, the latest in a series of update releases to the original LF National product suite. LF 2014 will focus on disturbances occurring in 2013 and 2014. In June 2016, LF 2014 will provide products for the South Central, North Central and Southwest GeoAreas. This will be followed by an October delivery to complete the CONUS and finally the delivery of AK and HI in December. For more information on LF 2014, including progress and detailed scope, please see the LF 2014 web page.

Automating the EVT Agreement Assessment Process 

LANDFIRE is committed to providing information about the usability of program products. To date, the only formal assessment of the quality of the existing vegetation type (EVT) spatial layer is associated with the original delivered version; subsequent versions were direct improvements or updates to that layer. However, significant new information has been used to generate an independent assessment of the usability of the LF 2010 and LF 2012 EVT products. The LF 2010 report is available; LF 2012 will be complete and posted soon.

The LANDFIRE Program is a cooperative agreement between the USDA Forest Service, agencies of the Department of the Interior, and The Nature Conservancy. In accordance with Federal law and U.S. Department of Agriculture policy, the Program is prohibited from discriminating on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, age, or disability.
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LANDFIRE Bulletin l Jeannie Patton l The Nature Conservancy l 2424 Spruce Street l Boulder, CO 80302
LANDFIRE@tnc.org

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