Duncan Lutes

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Duncan Lutes Systems for Environmental Management
Bob Keane USFS Research Ecologist, P.I. Carl
Key USGS Geographer John Caratti SEM
Systems Ecologist Nathan Benson NPS Fire
Ecologist Steve Sutherland USFS - Research
Ecologist Larry Gangi SEM Programmer Courtney
Couch USFS - Illustrator
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Why Monitor?
Required by Federal Law
Reservation Policy
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We need to know
Who initiated the treatments
What treatments were applied
When the treatments were applied
Where the treatments were applied
Why those treatments were used
Need to review treatment effectiveness to be
certain that goals and objectives have been
achieved and, if not, critically review
treatments to identify mistakes. (adaptive
management)
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What is FIREMON?
In brief, it is a fire effects monitoring package
that includes the following components
1) Integrated sampling strategy.
2) Sampling procedures.
3) Microsoft Access database.
4) Data analysis and report writing tools.
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FIREMON Components 1) Integrated Sampling Strategy
Uses project goals and objectives, and resources
to assist in determining

• What sampling approach to use
• Relevé
• Statistical

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FIREMON Components Integrated Sampling Strategy

• What sampling methods to use
• Surface Fuels
• Trees
• Vegetation
• Fire severity

What sampling intensity should be used for each
method 1) Detailed 2) Moderate 3) Simple
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FIREMON Components 2) Sampling methods

• Plot Description
• Registration and project codes
• Biophysical settings
• Cover estimates
• Tree
• Shrub
• Herbaceous
• Composite
• Fine and coarse woody debris
• Photo fields

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FIREMON Components Sampling methods

• Fuel Load
• Surface fuel biomass via
• Browns planar intercept for
• fine and coarse woody debris
• Profile for estimating duff/litter depth
• and the proportion of litter
• Live and dead herb and shrub cover, and height

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FIREMON Components Sampling methods

• Tree Data
• Live and Dead
• Overstory
• Understory
• Regeneration
• Species, status, DBH, height,
• percent live crown, crown position,
• age, scorch height, char height

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FIREMON Components Sampling methods
Species Composition Ocular estimate of
vegetation cover on 0.1 acre macroplot, by
species and layer
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FIREMON Components Sampling methods
Cover and Frequency Quadrat based estimation of
cover and rooted frequency by species.
Primarily used for grasses, forbs and small
shrubs.
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FIREMON Components Sampling methods
Density Counts of entities within belt transects
or quadrats.
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FIREMON Components Sampling methods
Point Cover Point based estimates of
low vegetation or ground cover, primarily less
than 4 feet tall.
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FIREMON Components Sampling methods
Line Intercept Cover estimates of, generally,
taller vegetation.
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FIREMON Components Sampling methods
Rare Species Individual plant survey and
mapping.
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FIREMON Components Sampling methods
Composite Burn Index Burn severity determined by
subjective rating of ecological components in
three strata substrate, understory, overstory.
Used for post-fire sampling.
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FIREMON Components Analysis method
Normalized Burn Ratio Landsat TM based
assessment of burn severity. Uses differences
in reflectance between before and after images
of fire. CBI methods are used to calibrate
imagery. Landscape scale, 30-meter resolution.
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Moose Fire, MT - 2001
Werner Peak Fire
Whitefish Lake
North Fork, Flathead
North
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FIREMON Components
Fire Behavior
General information related to burn conditions,
such as fuel moistures, RH, temp, wind speed,
plume behavior
Metadata
Table to store anything else - project
description, goals and objectives, sampling
modifications
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FIREMON Components Data Storage

• Plot Description
• Tree Data
• Fuel Load
• Species Composition
• Point Cover
• Density
• Cover/Frequency
• Line Intercept
• Composite Burn Index
• Fire Behavior
• Metadata

FIREMON database
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FIREMON Components 3) Database

• Designed to look like field data
• sheets.
• Fields have drop-down lists.
• FIREMON database is being used
• for the LANDFIRE project.

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FIREMON Components 4) Analysis Tools

• Ability to write reports and analyze field data.

• Uses sampling event to track changes over time.
• Group/summarize plots as desired.

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FIREMON Analysis Tools
Analysis Tools program includes exportable graphs
and reports at the plot level or by user defined
strata. Dunnetts multiple comparison procedure
to identify significant differences in attribute
means over time. Output of FVS-FFE ready tree
and fuels files.
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FVS-FFE files
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www.firelab.org/firemon and frames.nbii.gov