Title | Understanding ecological condition and change on rangelands managed by the Bureau of Land Management: An initial report |
Publication Type | Conference Paper |
Year of Publication | 2020 |
Authors | Burke R, McCord S, Kachergis E, Jeffries M, Dickard M, Greene A, Herrick JE, Lepak N, Pilliod D, Prentice K |
Conference Name | Ecological Society of America |
Date Published | 08/2020 |
Conference Location | Virtual Conference |
ARIS Log Number | 374688 |
Abstract | Background: Rangelands in the United States encompass a diversity of ecosystems, including the prairies of the Midwest and Great Plains, sagebrush shrublands, deserts, mountain meadows, and tundra in Alaska. The Bureau of Land Management (the BLM) manages nearly 244.4 million acres of federal lands in the lower 48 states and Alaska, of which 194 million are rangelands. The BLM’s standardized rangeland monitoring program, the Assessment, Inventory, and Monitoring (AIM) program, is designed to determine the status, condition, and trend of BLM’s rangeland ecosystems. These monitoring data provide a unique opportunity to understand the ecological condition of western United States rangelands at both local and ecoregional scales. Here we present preliminary results from the first 8 years of the national AIM monitoring program. We explore how dynamics of biotic integrity - including non-native invasive species, hydrologic function, and soil/site stability at the ecoregional scale are influenced by both wildfire and BLM vegetation treatment and restoration activities. |