Get reliable rangeland science

Eastern redcedar has invaded grasslands across the central United States, transforming vast areas of productive grassland into cedar forest. This biome-level transformation is threatening the sustainability and profitability of livestock production, precipitating declines in grassland wildlife, reducing available water resources, and threatening human safety by increasing wildfire danger. Eastern redcedar invasion has been linked to a reduction in the intensity and spatial extent of fires following European settlement of the Great Plains, which is the result of changes in human use of fire in the region. Human fire use varies relative to societal norms and policies regarding fire use, which determine conditions under which fire management can occur and the resulting range in fire intensities and scales of application available for meeting management goals. Given this, laws could be a major driver of patterns of Eastern redcedar invasion in the Great Plains. We developed a simulation model to explore the influence of specific laws on Eastern redcedar invasion in the Great Plains. This modeling exercise identified laws and policies that influence fire management as major drivers of the rate and extent of transition from grassland to cedar forest. For instance: 1) stringent liability standards decrease the number of managers who are willing to burn, thereby decreasing the spatial extent of fire in an area and allowing greater spread of redcedar into uninvaded areas 2) burning restrictions during periods of drought limit opportunities to burn under conditions where high fire intensities and attendant reductions in cover of mature redcedar can be acheived. Understanding the effects of laws and policies on redcedar invasion is necessary to assess trade-offs associated with legislatively limiting the scale and intensity of fire available to mangers and to avoid unintended consequences when developing legislation aimed at protecting grassland species.