Emily Jane Davis, Assistant Professor and Extension Specialist, Oregon State University Extension, & Sonia A. Hall, Center for Sustaining Agriculture and Natural Resources, Washington State University

Annual invasive grasses like cheatgrass, here appearing with a typical reddish tint, increase fuel loads and favor bigger fires, especially as the climate changes. Photo: Darrell Kilgore.
Wildfires in rangeland systems across the western United States, including the intermountain Northwest, are not going away. If anything, research and climate change modeling suggest that wildfire activity will continue to increase (Abatzoglou and Kolden 2011), and conditions support expansion of the annual invasive grasses, like cheatgrass, that increase fuel loads and favor bigger fires (Bradley et al. 2016). Yet wildfires are already an issue in these rangelands systems, for ranchers, natural resource managers, and conservationists worried about species like Greater sage grouse. So, tools that are helping make a difference now can become the path forward for addressing these issues in the future as well.
Wildfire impacts cross ownership boundaries, and ranchers are often closest to fires when they start. In the sagebrush steppe landscapes of eastern Oregon and Idaho, growing numbers of ranchers participate in Rangeland Fire Protection Associations (RFPAs) to help minimize these impacts. Continue reading