$12K+ raised

During early September 2020, as fires erupted throughout Oregon, a powerful east wind drove a wildfire down the McKenzie River valley near Eugene. This fire, the Holiday Farm Fire, destroyed hundreds of homes and businesses and ultimately burned 173,000 acres of forest land, including approximately 400 acres of the lower part of the HJ Andrews Experimental Forest. The fire displaced HJ Andrews staff, burned in sites over 450 years old and destroyed some critical research infrastructure and instruments.

“Even though Andrews staff were grieving the loss of their community, and in some cases, their homes, they demonstrated resilience. They responded to get instruments running and collecting data through a critical post-fire period,” said Katy Kavanagh, associate dean for research for the College of Forestry.

As Andrews Forest scientists coordinated efforts to use long-term monitoring and new measurements to understand the effects of the fire and track post-fire recovery, the wider community initiated an outpouring of giving, raising over $12,000 in two days to help displaced staff.

“The generosity of the Andrews community moved me to tears,” said USFS Science Liaison Cheryl Friesen, who lost her home in the fire.

“The kind words and generous donations mean so much to every employee impacted by this fire, thank you,” said Brenda Hamlow, the Andrews Forest site manager.

The efforts to protect Andrews forest and support the displaced and affected staff was a community effort. Over the years, the work to strengthen relationships between the Andrews Forest, the Pacific Northwest Research Station of the US Forest Service and the Willamette National Forest facilitated a rapid response and an understanding of the resources at risk.

Coordination between Willamette National Forest firefighters and Andrews Forest staff concerning fire suppression and containment activities was essential in protecting research installations and managing safety issues for fire crews. As efforts begin to repair the effects of the fire and fire suppression activities, Willamette National Forest personnel, some of whom were either evacuated from their homes or lost them entirely to the fire, are partnering with Andrews staff to perform this work.

“This is a deep and long-standing partnership; we are colleagues, friends, co-workers, the response was much like you would see from a family helping one another out in a time of tragedy,” said Michael Paul Nelson, the Ruth H. Spaniol Chair of Renewable Resources and Lead Principal Investigator for the HJ Andrews Experimental Forest.

The College of Forestry also stepped in to help people affected by the Oregon wildfires. The college quickly organized a donation drive for displaced families and emergency responders, filling four large vehicles with food and shelter items. The donations were distributed to Linn and Benton county evacuation shelters, and firefighter items were taken to the Oregon Department of Forestry in Sweet Home.

This story was part of the College of Forestry’s 2019-2020 Biennial Report.

As fast-moving fires tore through Oregon’s forests and communities, causing widespread and destructive impacts, Oregon State University College of Forestry researchers quickly organized to support the state’s response. Faculty and staff worked with partners to produce proposals and share research to help inform future policy decisions and support a systems-based, collaborative approach to recovery.

“The impact to human lives and livelihoods has been tragic,” says Tom DeLuca, Oregon State University’s Cheryl Ramberg-Ford and Allyn C. Ford Dean of the College of Forestry. “As we plan recovery, it is clear that it is inadequate just to say ‘we will rebuild.’”

Instead, DeLuca continues, the post-fire recovery will best be met by a systems-based approach that integrates water resources, fire-adapted infrastructure, communities and landscapes, and education and adaptation all within the context of a changing climate.

“This approach,” DeLuca explains, “aims to improve the resilience of forests and communities well into the future.”

Though fire has always been a part of our western landscapes, more than a century of widespread fire suppression and land use changes in Oregon have altered fuels, vegetation, and historical fire regimes. The intersection of climate change, drought, extreme weather, natural fire regimes and the ever-expanding human footprint has created a complicated fire equation. Fire seasons are longer, drier and hotter due to climate impacts and increase our risk of destructive wildfire while disproportionately increasing the burden on vulnerable populations. While it’s understandable to want a simple solution to fire concerns, the fire equation is too complicated for one-size-fits-all answers. From ignition to suppression to geography, the variables are constantly shifting.

“Fire is truly a global change issue and there is no single fix that we can invest in for success,” says Meg Krawchuk, associate professor of fire and landscape ecology. “These solution portfolios need to be tailored to particular landscapes and geographies and include the important social and ecosystem dimensions relevant to each place.”

The College of Forestry is world-renowned for its fire-related research, including fire history and ecology, fuels treatment (thinning and prescribed fire), risk analyses, and social dimensions, like work in governance, social justice and equity, and public health. OSU’s world-class Forestry and Natural Resources Extension Fire Program is the critical link that distributes information beyond campus, helping communities become more fire-adapted.

Some of the ways the College of Forestry’s fire research work aides Oregonians includes:

• Advising state and federal leaders on appropriate fire policy, including expanding strategic use of commercial thinning, prescribed fires, and managed wildfire as forest management tools.

• Researching impacts on soil and water quality.

• Assisting in post-fire planting and planning, including addressing and discussing questions around seed availability and appropriate seed zones, assisted migration and climate mitigation and availability of seedlings.

• Working collaboratively with agencies and partners to conduct research on prescribed burning versus suppression approaches and initiate activities to improve forest health and keep communities safe.

• Integrating Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Indigenous burning practices with emerging research and fire science.

• Launching the Forestry and Natural Resources Extension Fire Program in early 2020. The program assists in identifying Oregon landscapes in the highest need of a strategic focus of resources to reduce wildfire and landscape health risks at a statewide scale. It also assists with implementing projects on the ground in priority landscapes and provides education and outreach.

• Assuming a leadership role while working across disciplines with other OSU colleges, including the College of Agricultural Sciences and College of Engineering to support wildfire response and recovery.

The research and expertise within the College of Forestry can contribute to recovery and adaptation, but will not be sufficient on its own. The effort requires integrating emerging research with contributions from the impacted communities who have on-the-ground, experience-based knowledge, professional skills, and insights to apply to the task.

“The forest, the interface and your house are all connected fuel. The future work will include all landowners: homeowners, neighborhood associations, communities, small woodland owners or families, forest industry, Tribes, states and federal partners – all doing their part within their mission to sustain their land,” says John Bailey, professor of silviculture, forest and fire health.

The college is committed to producing science and research that helps guide the way towards a more fire-adapted future.

“Beyond integrating the strategic use of fire and fuels management into a vision for a sustainable future informed by Traditional Ecological Knowledge, we must focus attention and investment on human development patterns and fire adapted housing and communities,” DeLuca says. “We must also pay special attention to issues of social justice, equity and public health. Working together to address these issues will not be easy, but the costs of inaction are too high.”

This story was part of the College of Forestry’s 2019-2020 Biennial Report.

In a world infatuated with constant change, soundbites and breaking news every few minutes, a commitment to the long term can feel almost out of place.

But real change doesn’t happen overnight – it needs time, commitment and reflection. All of which exists at the H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) Program, managed by Oregon State University in partnership with the US Forest Service. First established in 1948 as a US Forest Service Experimental Forest, the Andrews, as it’s affectionately known, is a 16,000-acre ecological research site east of Eugene in Oregon’s western Cascades Mountains. The research program is part of the LTER network and one of 28 sites funded by the National Science Foundation.

This kind of commitment to long-term research produces transformative, influential science that has global impacts. The forest and its research have impacted policy and science, yet it’s relatively unknown to the general public.

“Most people in Oregon have never heard of the Andrews Forest and related research. Yet, we can trace many of our current ideas about forestry – the role of dead wood in a system, important work on carbon sequestration, important work on hydrology – directly back to Andrews Forest research,” says Michael Paul Nelson, Ruth H. Spaniol Endowed Chair of Renewable Resources and Lead-Principal Investigator for the H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest LTER program.

The work is critical, and at times, surprising. Nelson has nicknamed the exciting research done at the Andrews Forest ‘the ecology of surprise.’

“There are surprises about how complex our system is, but also how theory or observations elsewhere suggest one thing, and over time, we find quite another,” he says.

The breadth and depth of the research that’s present at the H.J. Andrews is impressive. Researchers throughout Oregon State University, across the state and worldwide conduct innovative, collaborative, multi-disciplinary research at the forest. It’s also a place where writers, artists and thought-leaders gather to reflect on the meaning and significance of the ancient forest ecosystem and its ever-evolving relationship to humans by studying ethics, arts, and humanities.

Even the leadership of the Andrews is unique. Instead of a biologist or an ecologist leading the work at Andrews, a philosopher is in charge. Nelson, professor of philosophy and environmental ethics in the College of Forestry, is one of only two non-biophysical scientists ever appointed to this leadership position in the history of the 28 long-term ecological research sites.

Reimagining forest research
In 1980, the HJ Andrews Forest was designated a LTER site by the NSF. Since its inception, it has received continuous NSF funding and in 2020, it received renewed NSF funding another six years.

“This is an amazing accomplishment as renewal is not guaranteed and several sites have been put on probation or lost funding,” says Katy Kavanagh, associate dean for research at the College of Forestry. “It’s indicative of the transformative science that can come from long-term research.”

Long-term research can give us insight into the future. However, as Nelson notes, nothing can predict the future. The Andrews Forest community was painfully reminded of this in September 2020 when fires erupted west of the Cascades burning over 400 acres of the lower part of the forest.

“The fire displaced our staff, burned a portion of the Andrews Forest, and is prompting our research imaginations in new ways,” Nelson says.

As a result, H.J. Andrews scientists are coordinating efforts to use long-term monitoring and new measurements to understand the effects of the fire and forest recovery. The fire is also encouraging scientists to ask more profound questions that are difficult to quantify. This study of fire, says Nelson, is a perfect example of the necessity of interdisciplinary research extending far beyond the sciences.

“Dramatic events like the fire provide us with an opportunity to exercise humility and use our imaginations to ask new questions, ultimately forging a new relationship with the world,” Nelson explains.

This story was part of the College of Forestry’s 2019-2020 Biennial Report.

Oregon State University’s College of Forestry is the new home of a forensics lab that fights timber crime, a $1 billion annual problem for the United States’ forest products industry.

The Wood Identification and Screening Center was previously headquartered in Ashland as a partnership between the Forest Service International Programs office and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Forensics Laboratory. Its move to Corvallis is the result of a $4 million, five-year grant from the United States Forest Service International Programs Office.

Scientists at the center use a specialized type of mass spectrometry for wood species identification to determine if a truckload of logs, a guitar, a dining room table or other wood products are what they are purported to be.

“We are thrilled WISC is here and eager to support their work to fight timber crime and identify illegal timber harvest and trade,” said Tom DeLuca, Cheryl Ramberg-Ford and Allyn C. Ford Dean of the College of Forestry. “The illegal timber trade devastates livelihoods and ecosystems in Oregon and other parts of the country and world.”

WISC’s relocation to Oregon State allows the center to expand its work through collaboration with the College of Forestry while maintaining the partnership with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The new partnership with Oregon State will allow the center to expand its reference databases to help law enforcement confirm the species and origin of wood products.

As part of the center’s relocation to the college’s Richardson Hall, Beth Lebow, director of WISC for USFS International Programs, has moved to Corvallis. Two WISC scientists, Cady Lancaster and Kristen Finch, have also joined the College of Forestry faculty as assistant professors.

“Many people don’t realize the scale of global illegal logging and its massive economic and environmental impacts,” Lebow explained. “It deprives governments and the legitimate forestry sector of revenue, funds global criminal networks involved in horrible acts and human rights abuses, contributes to climate change and biodiversity loss, and deprives the world’s one billion forest dependent people of their resources and livelihoods. As wood forensic technologies and databases continue to improve, they can play an increasingly important role in identifying illegal wood in trade.”

Since the 2008 amendments to the Lacey Act, it’s been against federal law to import illegally obtained wood into the United States. Importers are required to declare the species and country of origin of the timber they bring into the country.

Wood identification technologies are needed to thwart importers who try to skirt the law by intentionally declaring the wrong species or the wrong place where the timber came from.

WISC uses a method known as direct analysis in real-time of flight mass spectrometry, abbreviated to DART TOFMS. Using just a sliver of wood, scientists can identify the genus and species in minutes.

Oregon companies will benefit from the expertise WISC offers as an added component to their Lacey Act due-diligence systems. WISC expertise will also support Customs and Border Protection, Homeland Security and the Department of Agriculture’s Animal Plant Health Inspection System.

The center expects to become a training ground for scientists from universities, governments and other domestic and international partners.

“By being a service provider, trainer, and developer of wood ID methods that better meet law enforcement needs, WISC is helping the US and other countries use wood identification to verify the legality of wood products in trade,” Lebow said. “This ultimately helps combat global illegal logging and supports the viability and competitiveness of legitimate forest products.”

“WISC adds a critical new tool that we can employ to help Oregon’s forest products industry maintain global competitiveness,” said Eric Hansen, professor of forest products marketing and head of the College of Forestry’s Wood Science & Engineering Department. “The center also adds an exciting new element to our renewable materials bachelor’s degree program as students will have the opportunity to gain valuable work and research experience applicable to their future careers.”

This story was part of the College of Forestry’s 2019-2020 Biennial Report.