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PROJECT NEWS & UPDATES


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March 9, 2018

New publication highlighting use of unmanned aerial vehicles (drones) for rangeland and forestry applications through Oregon State University Extension Service.  Find the publication here.


October 17, 2017

Drier Conditions, More Wildfire, and Heightened Concerns About Forest Management in Eastern Oregon

This brief examines climate change and forest conditions in eastern Oregon. Eastern Oregon is experiencing warmer, drier conditions and increased numbers of wildfires. Surveys of the Oregon public find that forest health and wildfire threats are widely shared concerns. The more knowledgeable residents say they are about forest management, the more likely they are to say that forests are becoming less healthy. Read the press release. Read the brief.

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August 31, 2017
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Successful field season! ​Ethan Belair and Frankie Sullivan, with field assistance from Angela Boag, Michael Procko, and Mark Ducey, conducted a field campaign within the proposed Lostine Corridor public safety project area.  The results of this field campaign will be used for validation of regional forest structure maps being developed by Frankie along with Michael Palace.

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Wallowa Resources executive director and CAFOR collaborator Nils Christoffersen lends provides his thoughts about climate change, wildfire, and forest management in Wallowa County. ​Guest Column: Forest projects help ‘bend the climate curve’ in Wallowa County. Wallowa County Chieftain, August 8, 2017. See the article here.

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May 22, 2017
PhD Candidate Angela Boag awarded Graduate Research Innovation Award

CAFOR graduate research assistant and PhD candidate Angela Boag was awarded the Graduate Research Innovation (GRIN) Award by the Joint Fire Science Program.  Her project, "Impacts of multi-year drought on post-fire conifer regeneration in eastern Oregon" will focus on four wildfires in the Blue Mountains. This award will continue to support her dissertation research and outreach activities.  Congratulations Angela!

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September 23, 2016
New paper examining changing public opinion on climate change, wind energy, and wolves in eastern Oregon

A new study released in the journal Population & Environment led by PhD candidate Angela Boag examines public opinions about climate change, renewable energy, and wolves in Baker, Union, and Wallowa counties, Oregon.  Based on cross-sectional telephone survey data collected in 2011 and 2014, our observations suggest declining support for eliminating wolves, increased support for renewable energy, and increasingly favorable views of regulations that limit development in rural landscapes. We find that while demographic change and local events contribute to some of the observed shifts in opinion on wolves, exogenous factors acting at state and national levels likely contribute to shifting opinions on climate change, renewable energy, and land use regulations.

Link to the article here.

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August 23, 2016
Another successful field season completed

PhD Candidate Angela Boag is studying whether post-fire drought severity in the 2-3 years following fire affects natural regeneration in eastern Oregon, as has been suggested in other regions. Along with her field assistant Leah Bollin,  Angela sampled natural post-fire conifer regeneration in four fires over eight weeks, two that burned in 1996 and 2000 respectively in the Umatilla and Ochoco National Forests.  These data will provide new information about post fire recovery in hot-dry forest types.

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May 24, 2016
Restoring our forests in the face of climate change
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Climate trends in northeast Oregon and Washington are leading to extended late season drought and longer wildfire seasons – and the forests are losing against these conditions. The 2015 fire season set the record as the worst in U.S. history, totaling over 10 million acres burned nationally. The Blue Mountains alone reported more than 282,000 acres burned in wildfires. CAFOR research is featured in the latest issue.  This is the fifth of twelve issues of Features from the Blue Mountains Restoration Strategy brought to you by Sustainable Northwest and the U.S. Forest Service Blue Mountains Restoration Strategy Team. 

Link to the blog here:  http://www.sustainablenorthwest.org/blog/posts/restoring-our-forests-in-the-face-of-climate-change 

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April 27, 2016
CU Students: Work with us! 

The Communities and Forests in Oregon (CAFOR) project is seeking a summer field assistant for two months, June 20th - August 19th. The assistant will help a PhD student conduct post-fire forest regeneration surveys in the Blue Mountains of northeast Oregon. 

Qualifications: 
  • Must have experience backcountry camping for multiple nights
  • Willing to work outdoors in challenging conditions (rain, cold, hot weather) as well as unconventional hours (i.e. early mornings or evenings) to avoid hazards like extremely hot weather
  • Physically fit enough to hike several miles a day in rugged terrain 
  • Willing to spend multiple days camping with little cellphone coverage

Description of Work: Daily duties will include setting transects, counting and measuring trees, recording data and taking notes. Accommodation will be mostly camping with occasional motel stays. Note: This region of eastern Oregon is far from large urban centers or airports, so it's difficult to get away on weekends, but has lots of great hiking and weekend summer festivals in towns like John Day, Baker City and Enterprise. 

Compensation: In addition to $11.50/hr for 40 hrs per week, CAFOR provides a grocery allowance, transportation to/from Oregon, and  camping/motel accommodation. The assistant will also gain experience conducting field research. 

To Apply: Please send a cover letter and resume to angela.boag@colorado.edu by May 9th at 5 pm, and don't hesitate to get in touch with any questions you have. 


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February 26, 2016
Even local warming perceptions are colored by ideology

"Worsening wildfires endanger communities. Invasive insects imperil forests. In the American West, many worry about these threats — but fewer fret about climate change, a major force behind both the burning and the bugs," says blogger  Andrew Urevig
@aurevig. Full post found here.




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February 5, 2016

Wildfire, climate, and perceptions in Northeast Oregon

A new study released in the journal Regional Environmental Change examines local perceptions of wildfire and the connection to climate change in the Blue Mountains. A 2011 survey found area residents highly concerned about fire and insect threats, but not about climate change. In 2014 we conducted a second survey that, to explore this apparent disconnect, included questions about past and future summertime (fire season) temperatures. Although regional temperatures have warmed in recent decades at twice the global rate, accompanied by increasing dryness and fire risks, the warming itself is recognized by only 40% of our respondents. Awareness of recent warming proves unrelated to individual characteristics that might indicate experience on the land: old-timer versus newcomer status, year-round versus seasonal residence, and ownership of forested land. Perceptions of past warming and expectations of future warming are more common among younger respondents and less common among Tea Party supporters. The best-educated partisans stand farthest apart. Perceptions about local temperatures that are important for adaptation planning thus follow ideological patterns similar to beliefs about global climate change.

Link to the article here.

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February 2016
Public Support for Active Forest Management in Eastern Oregon Forests Grows

Following the disastrous 2015 fire season, we conducted a telephone survey in October and November of residents in Union, Baker, Wallowa, Crook, Wheeler, Grant, and Umatilla counties.  Sixty-five percent of the respondents said that “active management for national forests, with some tree thinning and/or grazing,” should be a high priority for land management in northeast Oregon. That 65% represents a modest but statistically significant increase from the 57% who gave this answer on an earlier survey in summer/fall 2014.

CAFOR work featured in the Central and Eastern Oregon Forestry and Natural Resources Extension newsletter. You can find  the article here.

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December, 2015

Congratulations to co-Investigator Dr. Forrest Stevens who has successfully defended his PhD dissertation at the University of Florida, Department of Geography. Forrest has co-developed many of the research objectives for CAFOR and has been there since the program began in 2008.  Awesome work Forrest!

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December 11, 2015

Congratulations to Morgan Crowley on a job well done in finishing her MS thesis "Non-Industrial Private Forest Landowner Engagement and Amenity-Driven Migration in Widlfire-Prone Landscapes of the Inland Northwest" at the University of New Hampshire. 

Rural counties in the Inland Northwest have a "working lands" culture that supports livelihoods dependent on the health of wildfire-prone private and public forests. Wildfires threaten economic livelihoods and exacerbate the challenges of working landscapes impacted by changing economies, demographic trends, and forest conditions. The main objectives of Morgan's thesis were to investigate: 1) what comprises amenity-driven migration and how are amenity-driven migration and wildfire severity related?; 2) are amenity-driven migrants engaged in forest management activities in Wallowa County, Oregon and what is forest management engagement?; 3) how does landowner parcel proximity from WUI, USFS land relate to perspectives of healthy forest, wildfire risk and how do geographic characteristics of amenity-driven migration relate to landowner perceptions of forest community transitions?

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December 8-10, 2015

Rural Voices for Conservation Coalition

Nils Christoffersen represented CAFOR at the RVCC Annual Meeting in Troutdale, OR.  Organized by Sustainable Northwest, the RVCC’s Annual Meeting provides an opportunity for participants to connect, engage, inspire, and develop solutions with partners working on rural conservation and economic development across the West. 

You can view our poster here.

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November 9-10,2015

Oregon Forest Collaboratives Network Workshop


CAFOR director Joel Hartter presented findings in Redmond, OR to more than 80 members of the 25 forest collaboratives in Oregon.  The meeting was a great opportunity to network, share lessons learned, and advance forest restoration discussions with agency, state, and rural community leaders. More here.

Joel presented with Wallowa Resources Executive Director Nils Christoffersen. Go here to view the presentation.

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October 1, 2015

Tracking Public Beliefs About Anthropogenic Climate Change

CAFOR scientist Larry Hamilton at UNH lead a study designed to match consensus statements by scientists with the general public from around the US.  Between 2010 and 2015, we asked the same questions on 35 nationwide, single state, or regional surveys in over 28,000 surveys.  Analysis of these data yields robust and exceptionally well replicated findings on public beliefs about anthropogenic climate change, including regional variations, change over time, demographic bases, and the interacting effects of education and political views. In all datasets political orientation dominates among individual-level predictors of climate beliefs. The continuing series of surveys provides a baseline for tracking how future scientific, political, socioeconomic or climate developments impact public acceptance of the scientific consensus.

You can access the article free here.  

The study's lead author Larry Hamilton wrote comments also in a blog entry here.

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August 27, 2015

On climate change and other topics, there is been a strong distrust of scientists in the US.  In this paper, we use data from a fall 2014 telephone survey to 7 counties in eastern Oregon along with counties in New Hampshire, to probe the mindset of the general public about climate change, forest management, and vaccines.   Claims of a broad conservative distrust of science have been countered by assertions that while conservatives might oppose the scientific consensus on climate change or evolution, liberals oppose scientists on some other core domains, notably vaccines.  In this study lead by CAFOR social scientist Larry Hamilton at the University of New Hampshire and the Carsey School of Public Policy, we tested that hypothesis.

Our analysis is featured in today’s Washington Post.

Full article here.


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August 5, 2015

A successful field season completed!

PhD student Angela Boag interviewed 50 private forest owners across four eastern Oregon counties this summer. She asked them about their land management priorities and the challenges they face regarding wildfire, drought, and forest health. She encountered a rich diversity of opinions on how forests should be managed to remain healthy and meet the needs of local communities. The results of the study will be synthesized over the coming year.
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James Perkins, a graduate student from the University of New Hampshire, spent the summer conducting aerial surveys with a drone. He collected data in the air and on foot across multiple sites in central and eastern Oregon with the goal of comparing their effectiveness at indicating the number and size of trees in the forest. This fall he will begin processing the imagery taken from the drone to evaluate its potential as a tool for forest inventory.


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July 30, 2015

CAFOR research featured in newest issue of Nature Climate Change. 

A link to the comment is here.






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July 2015

Paving the Way for New Opportunities: The CAFOR Project.

Read about the CAFOR's partnership with Wallowa Resources here.


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July 20, 2015

CAFOR research is featured in the June/July issue of the Blue Mountains Renewable Resource Newsletter (page 5).  You can find the newsletter here.

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April 21, 2015

Forest Views: Shifting Attitudes Toward the Environment in Northeast Oregon
In this brief, authors Angela Boag, Joel Hartter, Lawrence Hamilton, Forrest Stevens, Mark Ducey, Michael Palace, Nils Christoffersen and Paul Oester examine residents of northeast Oregon's individual perceptions of forests and natural resource management. 

 Their findings show that residents are generally well informed about declining forest health, and they identify active forest management as a high priority. Just over half of residents support increasing public land use fees to pay for forest restoration activities, while only a minority support raising local taxes. Compared to a similar survey in 2011, a larger proportion of participants in 2014 prioritize renewable energy development over drilling and exploration for oil, an increasing percentage believe that environmental rules limiting development have been good for their communities, and fewer support the elimination of wolves.


Read the Press Release      Read it Online


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February 11, 2015

Opinions about public lands and the actions of private non-industrial forest owners in the western United States play important roles in forested landscape management as both public and private forests face increasing risks from large wildfires, pests and disease. This work presents the responses from two surveys, a random-sample telephone survey of more than 1500 residents in northeast Oregon. Based on our results we argue that self-assessed understanding, interest in learning, and willingness to engage in extension activities together have leverage to affect perceptions about the risks posed by declining forest conditions on public lands, influence land owner actions, and affect support for public policies.

Access the article in PLOS ONE free here.


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January 23, 2015

A quarter century of log price and harvest data show market fluctuations in eastern Oregon.

Read more from CAFOR researcher Angela Boag in this month's Blue Mountains Renewable Resources Newsletter here.


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January 10, 2015
How has land cover change in Union and Baker counties between 1986 and 2011? The CAFOR team used Landsat satellite imagery to examine change in forest cover in northeastern Oregon. Find out about this change in the new paper published in Photogrammetric Engineering and Remote Sensing here.

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April 22, 2014

BIG NEWS!  CAFOR study funded through the USDA to study climate change in 7 counties in eastern OR. Work will now expand to cover much of the Blue Mountains Province.


USDA Awards Research Grants to Address the Impact of Climate Change on U.S. Agriculture Production

 UNH Receives Grant to Study Climate Change Adaptation in Wildfire-Prone Area



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April 8, 2014
 
How do forest landowners feel about local land management practices? This brief reports the results of a mail survey of forest landowners in northeastern Oregon conducted in the fall of 2012 by the Communities and Forests in Oregon (CAFOR) Project at the University of Colorado and the University of New Hampshire in cooperation with Oregon State University College of Forestry Extension. The mail survey was administered to understand who constituted forest landowners in these three coun­ties and their perceptions about forest management on both public and private land, as well as risks to forests in the area and the actions they have taken to reduce those risks. 
Read the issue brief: Forest Management and Wildfire Risk in Inland Northwest



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April 5, 2014

Incoming CAFOR PhD student Angela Boag was awarded a NSERC graduate fellowship from the Canadian government for her project, "Planning for future threats: combining climate and land use change projections to optimize the effectiveness of land conservation."  Congratulations Angela!



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September 18, 2013

CAFOR researchers publish study on environmental concerns in the journal Rural Sociology.

You can find a link here: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ruso.12023/abstract


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April 2013

CAFOR investigator Joel Hartter in Pendleton, OR for the annual Oregon Society of American Foresters meeting.  This conference focused on forestry in eastern OR.  Joel's presentation can be found here


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CAFOR featured in FAll 2012 Wallowa Resources newsletter.
Research Uncovers Social Attitudes Toward Changing Forests

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August 2012

Congratulations to Dan Maynard and Mickey Campbell on completing the MS Natural Resources degrees and their contribution to CAFOR.
Commentary on UNH research in Oregon in the LaGrande Observer. July 16, 2012.

Forest Views: Northeast Oregon Survey Looks at Community and Environment. Carsey Report. April 24, 2012.

Baker City Herald, June 23, 2011

Wallowa County Chieftain, June 23, 2011

Carsey Institute Researchers to Survey Oregon Residents on Views about Community and Forest, September 2, 2011

LaGrande Observer, June 15, 2011
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