Adaptation Strategies and Approaches for Managing Fire in a Changing Climate

Uplifting local ecological knowledge as part of adaptation pathways to wildfire risk reduction: A case study in Montseny, Catalonia (Spain)

Living with wildfires in an era of climate change requires adaptation and weaving together many forms of knowledge. Empirical evidence of knowledge co-production in wildfire management is lacking in Mediterranean European areas. We explored how local ecological knowledge can be leveraged to reduce wildfire risk through an adaptation pathways process in the Montseny massif and wider Tordera River watershed of Catalonia, Spain: an area stewarded through forestry and agriculture, tourism, nature conservation, and fire management. We combined different methods (e.g., a timeline and Three Horizons framework) throughout three workshops with agents of change to co-create adaptation pathways to reduce wildfire risk, integrating a historical perspective of the landscape while envisioning desirable futures. Our results showed that local ecological knowledge and other soft adaptation strategies contribute to innovative sustainable development initiatives that can also mitigate wildfire risk. The adaptation pathways approach holds much potential to inform local policies and support wildfire-based community initiatives in diverse contexts.

Microbial composition and function in reclaimed mine sites along a reclamation chronosequence become increasingly similar to undisturbed reference sites

Mine reclamation historically focuses on enhancing plant coverage to improve below and aboveground ecology. However, there is a great need to study the role of soil microorganisms in mine reclamation, particularly long-term studies that track the succession of microbial communities. Here, we investigate the trajectory of microbial communities of mining sites reclaimed between three and 26 years. We used high-throughput amplicon sequencing to characterize the bacterial and fungal communities. We quantified how similar the reclaimed sites were to unmined, undisturbed reference sites and explored the trajectory of microbial communities along the reclamation chronosequence. We also examined the ecological processes that shape the assembly of bacterial communities. Finally, we investigated the functional potential of the microbial communities through metagenomic sequencing. Our results reveal that the reclamation age significantly impacted the community compositions of bacterial and fungal communities. As the reclamation age increases, bacterial and fungal communities become similar to the unmined, undisturbed reference site, suggesting a favorable succession in microbial communities. The bacterial community assembly was also significantly impacted by reclamation age and was primarily driven by stochastic processes, indicating a lesser influence of environmental properties on the bacterial community. Furthermore, our read-based metagenomic analysis showed that the microbial communities' functional potential increasingly became similar to the reference sites. Additionally, we found that the plant richness increased with the reclamation age. Overall, our study shows that both above- and belowground ecological properties of reclaimed mine sites trend towards undisturbed sites with increasing reclamation age. Further, it demonstrates the importance of microbial genomics in tracking the trajectory of ecosystem reclamation.

Sensitivity of North American grassland birds to weather and climate variability

Grassland birds in North America have declined sharply over the last 60 years, driven by the widespread loss and degradation of grassland habitats. Climate change is occurring more rapidly in grasslands relative to some other ecosystems, and exposure to extreme and novel climate conditions may affect grassland bird ecology and demographics. To determine the potential effects of weather and climate variability on grassland birds, we conducted a systematic review of relationships between temperature and precipitation and demographic responses in grassland bird species of North America. Based on 124 independent studies, we used a vote-counting approach to quantify the frequency and direction of significant effects of weather and climate variability on grassland birds. Grassland birds tended to experience positive and negative effects of higher temperatures and altered precipitation. Moderate, sustained increases in mean temperature and precipitation benefitted some species, but extreme heat, drought, and heavy rainfall often reduced abundance and nest success. These patterns varied among climate regions, temporal scales of temperature and precipitation (<1 or ≥1 month), and taxa. The sensitivity of grassland bird populations to extreme weather and altered climate variability will likely be mediated by regional climates, interaction with other stressors, life-history strategies of various species, and species' tolerances for novel climate conditions.

Public and manager perceptions about prescribed fire in the Mid-Atlantic, United States

Firescapes of the Mid-Atlantic are understudied compared to other ecosystems in the United States, and little is known about the acceptance of prescribed fire as a forest management tool. Yet, this region harbors high levels of wildland-urban interface (WUI), has a close intermingling of land ownerships, and reflects substantial regional heterogeneity in burning histories and fire hazards. As prescribed fire is increasingly applied in the Mid-Atlantic as a critical tool to meet various land management objectives, research is needed to help managers understand community perceptions of prescribed fire implementation. Through intercept surveys of forest recreationists and online surveys of fire managers, this study investigates perceptions about prescribed fire use in the Mid-Atlantic, in addition to the critical contributing factors of public support toward prescribed fires. Two states, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, were selected as case studies to explore regional differences in social perception due to their contrasts in fire history, policy, management objectives, and social exposure. Our results show moderate social awareness of local prescribed fires, moderate to high familiarity with prescribed burning, high agency trust, and strong community support toward prescribed fires. However, the perceived concerns and benefits differed between managers and forest recreationists and between recreationists from Pennsylvania and New Jersey. The factors influencing the support of prescribed burning practices included forest management beliefs, concern about prescribed fire effects, familiarity with prescribed fires as a forest management tool, and awareness of local prescribed fires. Collectively, these results highlighted needs in public outreach to strengthen education, build broader community awareness, engage critical stakeholder groups such as forest recreationists, and re-align public outreach messages based on community-level concerns and perceived benefits. Additionally, it will be vital for the scientific community to help monitor critical shifts in forest value orientations and fill in significant research gaps regarding prescribed fire benefits.