Integrating Natural Disturbances and Management Activities to Examine Risks and Opportunities in the Central Oregon Landscape Analysis

We used state and transition models to integrate natural disturbances and management activities for a 275,000-ha landscape in the central Oregon Cascades. The landscape consists of a diverse mix of land ownerships, land use allocations, and environments. Three different management scenarios were developed from public input: (1) no management except wildfire suppression on federally managed lands: (2) manage Federal lands to increase multistory forests of large and very large trees; and (3) manage Federal lands to move toward historical conditions. All scenarios treated privately owned lands as if they were wildland urban interface (WUI) areas, and all recognized wilderness, reserves, and general forests within federally managed lands. Models were run for 200 years and 30 Monte Carlo simulations to include variability in fire years and other natural disturbances. Passive management on federally managed lands resulted in small increases in single-story and multistory large tree forests and increases in high-severity wildfire and insect outbreaks. Managing toward multistory large and very large tree forests resulted in minor increases in those forest types and increased wildfire and insect outbreaks. Contrary to intent, this scenario did not generate appreciable increases in multistory large and very large tree forests. Managing toward historical conditions resulted in strong increases in single-story large and very large tree forests and decreases in high-severity wildfire and insect outbreaks. All three scenarios resulted in conversion of most WUI to open grass, shrub, and forest conditions.