ConserveOnline | LANDFIRE

LANDFIRE

By admin on 4/19/2007 | Keyword(s): Special topics; Webpage; Fire

What is LANDFIRE?

LANDFIRE is a collaborative, 5-year partnership involving the U.S. Forest Service, Department of the Interior and The Nature Conservancy. Launched in 2004 and designed to be nationally consistent, locally relevant, and based on peer-reviewed scientific methods, the project is generating landscape-scale maps and data describing vegetation, fire, and fuels characteristics across the United States (including Alaska and Hawaii). The LANDFIRE project consists of two phases: a Rapid Assessment and the National Implementation. The Rapid Assessment is now complete and provides a small suite of interim data products for the lower 48 states of the U.S. (see information below) which can be used until the full suite of National Implementation data are complete for the entire U.S. These data and models will help agencies and partners better manage ecosystems and protect communities.

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LANDFIRE is mapping fire regime condition class (FRCC), which is an ecological metric used by federal agencies, The Nature Conservancy and others, to determine the degree to which the vegetation and fire regimes of a given area have changed compared to natural conditions. FRCC is a key variable in fuels treatment funding requests, National Fire Plan accomplishment reporting, monitoring conservation and restoration success, and biodiversity threat assessments.

For more information on LANDFIRE visit http://www.landfire.gov/
A wide variety of LANDFIRE tools and materials are available for download at http://conserveonline.org/workspaces/landfire.library

LANDFIRE data for conservation planning and action

LANDFIRE National products comprise a set of more than 1,000 vegetation dynamics models and over 20 digital maps of vegetation composition and structure, wildland fuel (crown and surface), simulated historical fire regimes, and current departure from simulated historical vegetation conditions. LANDFIRE National procedures integrate relational databases, remote sensing, systems ecology, gradient modeling, and landscape simulation to create consistent and comprehensive products that are standardized across the entire U.S. LANDFIRE is currently delivering national products on an incremental basis through 2009.

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These data could be used in conservation planning to:

Identify and quantify ecological targets;
Determine reference conditions;
Asses threats to conservation and management targets;
Evaluate strategies to abate threats and maintain or restore biodiversity;
Evaluate ecological departure from reference conditions;
Prioritize areas for treatment and restoration activities;
Measure results;
Communicate with stakeholders.

Currently completed LANDFIRE data products are free and available online at http://www.landfire.gov/.

Rapid Assessment Report is Now Available

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The Global Fire Initiative’s LANDFIRE team recently completed an assessment of the ecological role and integrity of fire regimes across the lower 48 states of the U.S., and implications for conservation. Based on newly available data from the LANDFIRE Rapid Assessment project, the analysis provides a broad-scale glimpse of the biodiversity health of U.S. forests, aridlands and grasslands.

The technical report An Ecological Assessment of Fire and Biodiversity Conservation Across the Lower 48 States provides a series of recommendations for the Conservancy and its U.S. partners if we are to maintain and restore fire’s ecological roles in ecosystems, and, therefore, effectively conserve biodiversity.

For more information, please contact the team at fire@tnc.org