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Southern Rockies Fire Science Network

Southern Rockies Fire Science Network

JFSP Fire Science Exchange Network

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Post-fire conditions in various fuel models in the Southern Rockies region

Full Infographic Here

Forested landscapes in Colorado are highly diverse. The Rocky Mountains create incredible variation in topography, soils, and moisture gradients, and this variability strongly influences the enormous diversity of understory and forest vegetation that grows in different places. Even with all this diversity, Colorado’s forests can be divided into several major forest types distributed across elevation gradients, as illustrated above. Fire is a necessary component of all these vegetation types and is an important force in shaping the forests we see today. Fire provides crucial ecosystem services to these forests, such as nutrient cycling, clearing out dead or diseased trees or accumulated fuel, and creating opportunities for new trees to grow. Each of these forest types responds differently to fire; read on for more details.

Posted by:
Gloria Edwards
Published on:
January 14, 2021

Categories: Highlights, Maps, Models, and AppsTags: CFRI, Colorado, Colorado Front Range, Colorado State University, Disturbance-driven vegetation change, ecosystem recovery, ecosystem resilience, Ecosystem Restoration, ecosystem services, Fire and Traditional Knowledge, fire regime, fire return interval, fire-dependent ecosystems, fire-prone ecosystems, fuel management, fuel modeling, pinyon juniper ecosystems, Rocky Mountains, sagebrush, vegetation categories, vegetation density, vegetation management, vegetation treatments, vegetation type change

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This regional Fire Exchange is one of 15 regional fire science exchanges sponsored by the Joint Fire Science Program (JFSP).
View resources from multiple exchanges.