How is Fire Ecology Different than Classical Ecology with USDA Forest Service’s Brice Hanberry

On this week's show, we'll talk with USDA Forest Service's Brice Hanberry. Brice will discuss the loss and importance of "open forests" in comparison to the mostly "closed forests" we have today. Surface fires maintained open forests by providing a unique and important process that removes small trees, allowing growing space for herbaceous vegetation. Following Euro-American settlement, fires were excluded and historical accounts document the rapid growth of trees. Historical forests offer different options for ecology and management, including better support of biodiversity and preparation for a warming climate with expected increases in severe fires, drought, and insect outbreaks.

For this seminar, Brice will define open forest composition and structure along with probable extent, in comparison to current forest structure and composition in the eastern United States. She also will illustrate several lines of evidence indicating that factors other than fire and fire exclusion, such as herbivory and precipitation, do not appear to be influential on forest composition and structure at landscape scales. Brice will differentiate fire ecology from classical ecology and how its loss is more important that tree diversity and succession, which questions conventional wisdom surrounding ecology today.

Brice Hanberry is a Research Ecologist with the Maintaining Resilient Dryland Ecosystems program of the Rocky Mountain Research Station. Her interests include understanding ecosystems under different drivers and integrating ecosystem changes with ecosystem and wildlife management at multiple scales across many extents. Current research involves historical ecosystems of open forests maintained by fire, tree biomass simulations under climate change, and juniper tree encroachment in grasslands and shrublands.

Brice's research interests include analysis and management of disturbance effects including fire and fire exclusion, climate change, and land use on terrestrial ecosystems, natural resources, and wildlife at multiple scales, with a particular focus on open oak and pine ecosystems. Oak and pine savannas and woodlands are part of a continuum between grasslands and closed forests. The unique bipartite characteristics of grasslands with a tree overstory are not recognized and therefore, undervalued for conservation and management.