In: Crist, Michele R.; Chambers, Jeanne C.; Phillips, Susan L.; Prentice, Karen L.; Wiechman, Lief A., eds. Science framework for conservation and restoration of the sagebrush biome: Linking the Department of the Interior’s Integrated Rangeland Fire Management Strategy to long-term strategic cons..., 2019
In: Crist, Michele R.; Chambers, Jeanne C.; Phillips, Susan L.; Prentice, Karen L.; Wiechman, Lief A., eds. Science framework for conservation and restoration of the sagebrush biome: Linking the Department of the Interior’s Integrated Rangeland Fire Management Strategy to long-term strategic cons..., 2019
The sagebrush biome is a dryland region in the western United States experiencing rapid transform... more The sagebrush biome is a dryland region in the western United States experiencing rapid transformations to novel ecological states. Threat‐based approaches for managing anthropogenic and ecosystem threats have recently become prominent, but successfully mitigating threats depends on the ecological resilience of ecosystems. We used a spatially explicit approach for prioritizing management actions that combined a threat‐based model with models of resilience to disturbance and resistance to annual grass invasion. The threat‐based model assessed geographic patterns in sagebrush ecological integrity (SEI) to identify core sagebrush, growth opportunity, and other rangeland areas. The resilience and resistance model identified ecologically relevant climate and soil water availability indicators from process‐based ecohydrological models. The SEI areas and resilience and resistance indicators were consistent—the resilience and resistance indicators showed generally positive relationships wit...
The spatial patterns and context of invasions are increasingly recognized as important for succes... more The spatial patterns and context of invasions are increasingly recognized as important for successful and efficient management actions. Beyond mapping occurrence or percent cover in pixels, spatial summary information that describes the size and arrangement of patches in the context of a larger landscape (e.g., infested regions, connected patch networks) can add a depth of information for managing invasive grasses that threaten native ecosystems. Few invasive annual grass analyses have explored the use of landscape and circuit-based connectivity metrics to characterize and compare spatial patterns of invasion. To assess the transferability and applicability of these landscape ecology analyses, we calculated landscape metrics (4 area-based, 3 configuration) and a connectivity metric (circuit-based centrality), using a weighted-average map of invasive annual grass cover in the Great Basin, USA. We calculated metrics at local and regional scales, allowing invasion statistics to be comp...
Context Minimizing negative impacts of wildfire is a major societal objective in fire-prone lands... more Context Minimizing negative impacts of wildfire is a major societal objective in fire-prone landscapes. Models of fire connectivity can aid in understanding and managing wildfires by analyzing potential fire spread and conductance patterns. We define ‘fire connectivity’ as the landscape’s capacity to facilitate fire transmission from one point on the landscape to another. Objectives Our objective was to develop an approach for modeling fire connectivity patterns representing potential fire spread and relative flow across a broad landscape extent, particularly in the management-relevant context of fuel breaks. Methods We applied an omnidirectional circuit theory algorithm to model fire connectivity in the Great Basin of the western United States. We used predicted rates of fire spread to approximate conductance and calculated current densities to identify connections among areas with high spread rates. We compared existing and planned fuel breaks with fire connectivity patterns. Resu...
In: Crist, Michele R.; Chambers, Jeanne C.; Phillips, Susan L.; Prentice, Karen L.; Wiechman, Lief A., eds. Science framework for conservation and restoration of the sagebrush biome: Linking the Department of the Interior’s Integrated Rangeland Fire Management Strategy to long-term strategic cons..., 2019
In: Crist, Michele R.; Chambers, Jeanne C.; Phillips, Susan L.; Prentice, Karen L.; Wiechman, Lief A., eds. Science framework for conservation and restoration of the sagebrush biome: Linking the Department of the Interior’s Integrated Rangeland Fire Management Strategy to long-term strategic cons..., 2019
The sagebrush biome is a dryland region in the western United States experiencing rapid transform... more The sagebrush biome is a dryland region in the western United States experiencing rapid transformations to novel ecological states. Threat‐based approaches for managing anthropogenic and ecosystem threats have recently become prominent, but successfully mitigating threats depends on the ecological resilience of ecosystems. We used a spatially explicit approach for prioritizing management actions that combined a threat‐based model with models of resilience to disturbance and resistance to annual grass invasion. The threat‐based model assessed geographic patterns in sagebrush ecological integrity (SEI) to identify core sagebrush, growth opportunity, and other rangeland areas. The resilience and resistance model identified ecologically relevant climate and soil water availability indicators from process‐based ecohydrological models. The SEI areas and resilience and resistance indicators were consistent—the resilience and resistance indicators showed generally positive relationships wit...
The spatial patterns and context of invasions are increasingly recognized as important for succes... more The spatial patterns and context of invasions are increasingly recognized as important for successful and efficient management actions. Beyond mapping occurrence or percent cover in pixels, spatial summary information that describes the size and arrangement of patches in the context of a larger landscape (e.g., infested regions, connected patch networks) can add a depth of information for managing invasive grasses that threaten native ecosystems. Few invasive annual grass analyses have explored the use of landscape and circuit-based connectivity metrics to characterize and compare spatial patterns of invasion. To assess the transferability and applicability of these landscape ecology analyses, we calculated landscape metrics (4 area-based, 3 configuration) and a connectivity metric (circuit-based centrality), using a weighted-average map of invasive annual grass cover in the Great Basin, USA. We calculated metrics at local and regional scales, allowing invasion statistics to be comp...
Context Minimizing negative impacts of wildfire is a major societal objective in fire-prone lands... more Context Minimizing negative impacts of wildfire is a major societal objective in fire-prone landscapes. Models of fire connectivity can aid in understanding and managing wildfires by analyzing potential fire spread and conductance patterns. We define ‘fire connectivity’ as the landscape’s capacity to facilitate fire transmission from one point on the landscape to another. Objectives Our objective was to develop an approach for modeling fire connectivity patterns representing potential fire spread and relative flow across a broad landscape extent, particularly in the management-relevant context of fuel breaks. Methods We applied an omnidirectional circuit theory algorithm to model fire connectivity in the Great Basin of the western United States. We used predicted rates of fire spread to approximate conductance and calculated current densities to identify connections among areas with high spread rates. We compared existing and planned fuel breaks with fire connectivity patterns. Resu...
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Papers by Michele Crist