Fuels Management

Project: Head Stewardship Project
Client: Melcher Logging Companies – Contract with USFS Deschutes National Forest
Dates: November 2008 - Ongoing
Services Provided: IRM is teamed with Melcher Logging to provide restorative mowing services on the Head Stewardship Project located in the Metolius Basin on the Deschutes National Forest.  IRM used its two Lightfoot™ machines to mow down competing vegetation in both Ponderosa pine plantations and old growth.  Combined with the logging which Melcher Logging is conducting, this operation will fully restore the ecosystem of the basin and return the forest to a condition which will allow for maintenance through the use of prescribed fire.

Project: Fuels Inventory – Firemon Plots
Client: Bureau of Indian Affairs
Dates: Fall 2008 and June 2009
Services provided: IRM assisted the BIA by installing 639 Firemon plots on 7 reservations throughout Wyoming and Montana. IRM designed a data collection program and a MS Access Database to convert the data into a format compatible with the Firemon Database Program. The data collected will be used to fine-tune the fuels prescriptions on the reservations.

Project: Fuels Reduction
Client: Douglas Forest Protection Association
Dates: March 2003 – May 2008
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 124 acres of Scotch Broom and blackberry in a fuels reduction effort.

Project:  Western Oregon Fire Plan
Client:  Forest Restoration Partnership
Date:  Summer 2006/2007
Services Provided:  IRM developed a community wildfire protection plan for two large subdivisions near Corvallis, Oregon. Stand inventories and fuel sampling was completed, FLAMMAP analysis of fire behavior conducted, and recommendations made to reduce property loss, restore forest health, and increase public safety.

Project: Fuels Reduction
Client: Ashland Fire
Dates: June 2007
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 23 acres of Manzanita in a fuels reduction effort.

Project: Oak Thinning and Restoration
Client: Steven Groh
Dates: October 2006 – June 2007
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 120 acres of fuels reduction and oak restoration efforts.

Project: Fuels Inventory – Firemon Plots
Client: Bureau of Indian Affairs, Jicarilla-Apache Reservation, Dulce NM
Dates: November 2006, May 2007
Services provided: IRM assisted the BIA by installing 667 Firemon plots on a project area on the Jicarilla-Apache Indian Reservation in north central New Mexico. IRM designed a data collection program and a MS Access Database to convert the data into a format compatible with the Firemon Database Program. The data collected will be used to fine-tune the fuels prescriptions on the reservation

Project: Fuels Reduction
Client: Victor Ribera
Dates: March 2007
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 4 acres of Manzanita in a fuels reduction effort.

Project: Fuels Reduction
Client: Applegate Valley Rural Fire Protection District #9
Dates: December 2004 – March 2007
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 224 acres of Manzanita in a fuels reduction effort.

Project: Fuels Reduction
Client: Reggie Pearne
Dates: February 2007
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 5 acres of Manzanita in a fuels reduction effort.

Project: Fuels Reduction
Client: Applegate River Watershed Council
Dates: January 2007
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 18 acres of Manzanita in a fuels reduction effort.

Project: Metolius Preserve Slash Mowing
Client: Deschutes Basin Land Trust
Dates: November 2005 – May 2006, November 2006 – January 2007
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 260 acres of slash clean-up in a fuels reduction effort.

Project: Fuels Reduction
Client: Cecil Drinkward
Dates: January 2007
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 12 acres of Manzanita in a fuels reduction effort.

Project: Fuels Reduction
Client: Keno Rural Fire Protection District
Dates: June 2006 – January 2007
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 20 acres of Manzanita in a fuels reduction effort.

Project:  Florida Fuels Inventory
Client:  MDA Federal, Inc.
Date:  Spring-Winter 2006
Services Provided: In the Spring of 2007, IRM was retained by the Florida Division of Forestry to design a sampling system to quantify fuels loading statewide, and to train Division employees in the system and field measurements. IRM also wrote a DataPlus Professional® data collection application to facilitate the field data gathering. Marc Barnes, spent a week in Florida training the Division crews.

Project:  Crescent Junction Fuels Reduction
Client:  Forest Restoration Partnership
Date:  Spring-Fall 2006
Services Provided: During the summer of 2006, IRM implemented a National Fire Plan grant in the community of Crescent Junction in Klamath County Oregon. IRM conducted landowner outreach, wrote stand prescriptions, marked the stands and supervised the implementation of the fuels treatments. Stands were thinned using IRM’s Lightfoot™ machine. Defensible space was treated using hand crews. Over 80 acres were treated.

Project: Fuels Reduction
Client: Walker Range Forest Protection Association
Dates: November 2006
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 86 acres of pine thinning and brush mowing in a fuels reduction effort.

Project: Fuels Reduction
Client: John and Arlene Kalita
Dates: October 2006
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 12 acres of Manzanita in a fuels reduction effort.

Project: Fuels Reduction
Client: Ken Snoke
Dates: October 2006
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 24 acres of Manzanita in a fuels reduction effort.

Project: Fuels Reduction
Client: Bill Dodge
Dates: June 2006
Services Provided: The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate 42 acres of Manzanita in a fuels reduction effort.

Project:  Jicarilla-Apache Fire/Fuels Analysis
Client:  Jicarilla- Apache Agency BIA
Date:  Spring-Summer 2006
Services Provided: IRM completed a fire risk analysis using FLAMMAP of forestland within a 14,276 acre planning area on the Jicarilla Apache Reservation for the purpose of identifying stands at greatest risk of catastrophic fire, and prioritizing treatments to reduce losses both in timber, wildlife, and watershed resources. A vegetation classification system was also developed to help identify gamble oak plant communities. This image classification procedure synthesized satellite image data with field and ancillary data derived principally from Geographic Information System (GIS) coverages. A supervised classification strategy was adopted to create the vegetation map based on vegetation community types. Object-oriented classification methods was then used to separate vegetation types. The advantage of this approach is that these objects will preserve edge boundaries of detailed surface features such as roads, cliffs and drainages – features that would be lost or misclassified in a pixel-based classification. The image object map was then converted into polygons which were imported into a feature dataset in ESRI ArcGIS (v. 9.1). Landfire and field collected data were used in FLAMMAP to analyze fire behavior. 

Project: Metolious Preserve Fuel Reduction
Client: Deschutes Basin Land Trust
Dates: 2006
Services Provided: IRM was contracted to reduce high fuel buildups in pine stands on 100 acres of pine forest on the Metolious Preserve. Treatments were completed using hand crews, falling and jackpot piling fuels. Piles were burnt and burn circles seeded with native grass.

Project: Fuels Inventory – FMA Plus Plots
Client: Rocky Boys Indian Reservation, Billings Montana
Dates: November 2005
Services provided: IRM assisted the BIA by installing 1200 plots on a project area on the Jicarilla-Apache Indian Reservation in north central New Mexico. IRM designed a data collection program and a MS Access Database to convert the data into a format compatible with the Fuels Management Analyst™ fire behavior program. The data collected will be used to fine-tune the fuels prescriptions on the reservation

Project: Fuels Inventory – Firemon Plots
Client: Bureau of Indian Affairs, Jicarilla-Apache Reservation, Dulce NM
Dates: April 2005
Services provided: IRM assisted the BIA by installing 1400 Firemon plots on a project area on the Jicarilla-Apache Indian Reservation in north central New Mexico. IRM designed a data collection program and a MS Access Database to convert the data into a format compatible with the Firemon Database Program. The data collected will be used to fine-tune the fuels prescriptions on the reservation

Project:  Klickitat Landscape Level Oak Restoration Project 
Client:  Forest Restoration Partnership
Date:  Summer-Fall 2004
Services Provided:  Integrated Resource Management restored oak savannas and woodlands in the Klickitat River Canyon, an area that contains the largest concentration of these habitats in Washington State.  Activities included thinning stands to remove conifers and over-stocked oak, use of goats and brush mowing to reduce shrub cover, and native seeding to re-establish bunchgrass communities.  Silvicultural prescriptions were based on reducing extreme fire behavior and associated fire effects, increasing mast production and tree vigor, and habitat needs of the western grey squirrel.  A combination of low impact skid steer (LightfootTM) with a sheer, and hand crews were used during thinning operations.

Project: Fuels Inventory – FMA Plus Plots
Client: Bureau of Indian Affairs, Jicarilla-Apache Reservation, Dulce NM
Dates: April – July 2004
Services provided: IRM assisted the BIA by installing 1200 plots on a project area on the Jicarilla-Apache Indian Reservation in north central New Mexico. IRM designed a data collection program and a MS Access Database to convert the data into a format compatible with the Fuels Management Analyst™ fire behavior program. The data collected will be used to fine-tune the fuels prescriptions on the reservation

Project:  Metolius Preserve Fuels Assessment, Fire Behavior Analysis and Fuel Reduction Prescriptions
Client:  Deschutes Basin Land Trust
Dates:  April 2004
Services Provided:  Integrated Resource Management designed a fuels inventory system for the Deschutes Basin Land Trust in Central Oregon.  The fuels inventory was compiled using Fuels Management Analyst (FMA), a comprehensive fire management tool that determines fuels loading, crown mass and crown fire behavior.  The fuels and associated inventory was used to analyze potential fire effects and behavior using BEHAVE and FMA under several management scenarios. Silvicultural prescriptions to reduce fire behavior and effects within desired parameters were developed.  These prescriptions were integrated into the Metolius Preserve Forest Stewardship plan that IRM completed in August of 2004. 

Project:  Fuels Reduction and Oak Restoration
Client:  Rowena Wilds Landowners
Dates:  Winter 2004
Services Provided:  Rowena Wilds is a planned rural housing development that was designed around strict ecological covenants.  The 200 acre community located at the eastern edge of the Columbia Gorge, southeast of Mosier, Oregon contains high-quality remnant pine and oak habitats that have been encroached with fir and oak regeneration.  IRM worked closely with Rowena Wilds’ landowners to design forest restoration prescriptions to reduce forest fuels and restore savanna habitats.  Funding was provided by a fuel reduction grants from the Oregon Department of Forestry.  IRM designed silvicultural prescriptions that achieved the fuel reduction standards required by the state, while enhancing oak habitat, and preserving the visual qualities of the forest using a technique called “mosaic thinning”.  Restorative treatments were tailored to the specific needs of each landowner to maintain a desired aesthetic.  IRM completed thinnings, removed slash and re-seeded burn piles.

Project:  Fuels Reduction                    
Client:  Sutherlin School District 
Dates:  October 2003 
Services Provided:  The Lightfoot™ was mounted with the Fecon Bullhog to mow and masticate a field of English hawthorn which had invaded an old pasture. The hawthorn measured up to 6” in DBH and over 15’ tall.

Project:  Fuels Reduction 
Client:  Jicarilla Apache Indian Reservation 
Dates:  June 2003-August 2003     
Services Provided:  The Lightfoot™ was used to shear the understory trees up to 12” DBH, and then build burn piles. The shaded fuel break will protect a neighboring development in the Wildland Urban Interface (WUI).

Project: Stump Springs Fuel Reduction Silvicultural Prescriptions
Client: Dixie National Forest
Dates: July 2003
Services Provided: Integrated Resource Management prepared silvicultural prescriptions in support of the Stump Springs Fuel Reduction Project Environmental Assessment it completed for the Escalante Ranger District. Prescriptions included specific targets for stand density and surface fuel reduction using prescribed fire in meadow, pinyon-juniper, ponderosa pine and mixed conifer vegetation communities. Mitigation measures to address resource concerns including cryptobiotic soils, goshawk nests and riparian areas were synthesized in the prescriptions.

Project:  Fuels Reduction 
Client:  Jicarilla Apache Indian Reservation 
Dates:  June 2003-August 2003      
Services Provided:  The Lightfoot™ was used to shear the understory trees up to 12” DBH, and then build burn piles. The shaded fuel break will protect a neighboring development in the Wildland Urban Interface (WUI).

Project: Lagunas Bonitas Forest Stewardship and Integrated Fuels Reduction Plan
Client: Forest Restoration Partnership, Trust for Public Land, New Mexico State Forestry
Dates: March 2001 - February 2003
Services Provided: Integrated Resource Management developed a forest stewardship plan for the Lagunas Bonitas Ranch in Northern New Mexico. The ranch is the state of New Mexico’s pilot partnership with the USFS’s Forest Legacy Program. The plan focused on restoration of range and forest ecosystems and development of compatible grazing and forest harvest systems. A key element of the plan was to devise silvicultural prescriptions for restoration of ponderosa pine and mixed conifer forests. Forests across the ranch have been highly degraded due to fire suppression and past timber harvest.

Project: CFI Permanent Plot Fuels Inventory
Client: Bureau of Indian Affairs, Jicarilla-Apache Reservation, Dulce NM
Dates: June 2002 – September 2002
Services provided: IRM assisted the BIA by installing permanent fuels inventory plots across all forested portion of the Jicarilla-Apache Indian Reservation in north central New Mexico. The plots were located on a 40-chain spacing and IRM crews used Trimble GEO 3 GPS receivers to navigate to the plots and to locate their exact position. Data was post-differential corrected for sub-3 meter accuracy.