ABSTRACT
Forest wildfires consume and redistribute carbon within forest carbon pools. Because the incidence of wildfires is unpredictable, quantifying wildfire effects is challenging due to the lack of prefire data or controls from experiments over a large landscape. We explored a quasi-experimental method, propensity score matching, to estimate wildfire effects on aboveground forest woody carbon mass in Washington and Oregon, United States. Observational data, including national forest inventory plot measurements and satellite imagery metrics, were utilized to obtain a control set of unburned plots that are comparable to burned plots in terms of environmental conditions as well as spatial locations. Three matching methods were implemented: propensity score matching (PSM), spatial matching (SM), and distance-adjusted propensity score matching (DAPSM). We investigated if propensity score matching with and without spatial adjustment led to different outcomes in terms of (1) balance in covariate distributions between burned and control plots, (2) mean carbon mass obtained from the selected control plots compared to burned and all unburned plots, and (3) estimates of wildfire effects by burn severity. We found that PSM and SM, which use only the environmental covariate set or the spatial distance for estimating propensity scores, respectively, did not appear to produce a comparable set of control plots in terms of the estimated propensity scores and the outcomes of mean carbon mass. DAPSM was the preferred method both in balancing the observed covariates and in dealing with unobservable confounding variables through spatial adjustment. The average wildfire effects estimated by DAPSM showed clear evidence of redistribution of carbon among aboveground woody pools, from live to dead trees, but the consumption of total woody carbon by wildfire was not substantial. Only moderate burn severity led to significant reduction of total woody carbon mass across Washington and Oregon forests (64% of control plots remained on average). This study provides an applied example of a quasi-experimental approach to quantify the effects of a natural disturbance for which experimental settings are unavailable. The study results suggest that incorporating spatial information in addition to environmental covariates would yield a comparable set of control plots for wildfire effects quantification.
Subject(s)
Fires , Wildfires , Carbon , Forests , Oregon , Trees , United States , WashingtonABSTRACT
Effective management of invasive plants conserves biodiversity values, reduces economic costs, and minimizes negative impacts on human health. Fostering people's awareness of invasive plants is one of the most cost-effective approaches in preventing the spread and introduction of invasive plants. Therefore, this study aims to understand (1) people's knowledge and risk perceptions, (2) associations between risk perceptions and demographics, and (3) people's willingness to support current management strategies in the Metro Vancouver region, British Columbia, Canada. An online survey was carried out and received 356 responses across the region. We found that people's knowledge and risk perceptions of invasive plants were ecologically oriented. Older respondents perceived higher risks of invasive plants. Among respondents of the same age, annual income higher than $50,000 was associated with higher levels of risk perception. Respondents who had professional and/or recreational group memberships perceived higher economic risks. Respondents highly supported activities that they could take part in directly, such as community invasive pulls and native species planting. Overall, our findings aid managers in allocating appropriate funding or tailoring outreach efforts to different aspects of invasive plants as well as groups/communities where people's knowledge and risk perceptions of invasive plants are low.
