Table 1 Comparisons of wilderness fire science reviews through time
Paper | Identified areas of progress | Identified priority research areas |
|---|---|---|
Kilgore 1987 | • Fire regimes & fire history • Fire effects (on wildlife, insects/disease, nutrient cycling, diversity/stability) • Fire behavior | • What is “natural”? • Role of Indigenous fire in wilderness • Role of prescribed fire in wilderness • How has suppression impacted forest structure/composition? • Fire effects on habitats of endangered species • Barriers to wilderness fire management |
Agee 2000 | • Drivers of wilderness fire • Fire regimes • Models, data | • Improve fire weather models and data inputs • Incorporate more complexity into fire models • Consider fires in landscape context • Barriers to wilderness fire management |
Miller and Aplet 2016 | • Models, tools, and data • Fire as a driver of complexity • Fire as a landscape process • Barriers to wilderness fire management | • Identify opportunities for fire at the landscape scale • Effects of fire when allowed to burn in moderate weather conditions • Better accounting of risks and benefits of wilderness fire • Perceptions and responses of people to fire risk |
This study | • Self-limitation • Forest and aquatic ecosystem dynamics under active fire regimes • Wilderness fire management • Impacts of fire on recreation | • Fire effects beyond vegetation • Climate change and fire • Role of Indigenous burning in wilderness • Role of prescribed fire in wilderness • Barriers to wilderness fire management |