Historical Environmental Variation in Conservation and Natural Resource Management

About the Editors John Wiens is a landscape ecologist and conservation scientist who was on the faculties of several universities in the United States before joining The Nature Conservancy as Chief Scientist in 2002. He has published over 200 scientific papers and six books, and has conducted research in Europe, South America, and Australia as well as the United States. He is currently Chief Conservation Science Officer at PRBO Conservation Science in California and is a visiting faculty member at the University of Western Australia in Perth. He lives in Corvallis, Oregon. Greg Hayward, Regional Wildlife Ecologist with the U.S. Forest Service in Alaska, is a population ecologist with a passion for helping resource managers understand the trade-offs associated with difficult land management decisions. As a conservation practitioner, Greg brings an academic perspective from faculty positions at the University of Idaho and University of Wyoming. Greg's research extends from boreal owls and flying squirrels to Amur tigers and cutthroat trout with a focus on the consequences of broad scale ecological disturbance on wildlife dynamics. Hugh Safford is Regional Ecologist for the USDA Forest Service Pacific Southwest Region, which includes California, Hawaii, and the Pacific Territories, and a research faculty affiliate with the Department of Environmental Science and Policy, University of California-Davis. Catherine Giffen, most recently a biological scientist with the U.S. Forest Service National Office in Washington, DC, specializes in regulatory compliance and land management planning. Prior to working with the National Office she spent time in the eastern and western regions of the country working in forest management and natural resource planning. She has over 15 years of experience working with national, regional, and forest-level land management programs.

• Contributors viiForeword xPreface xiiAcknowledgments xivSection 1 Background and History 1John A. Wiens1 Setting the stage: theoretical and conceptual background of historical range of variation 3William H. Romme, John A. Wiens, and Hugh D. Safford2 Development of historical ecology concepts and their application to resource management and conservation 19Wayne Padgett, Barbara Schrader, Mary Manning, and Timothy TearSection 2 Issues and Challenges 29Hugh D. Safford3 Challenges in the application of historical range of variation to conservation and land management 32Gregory D. Hayward, Thomas T. Veblen, Lowell H. Suring, and Bob Davis4 Historical ecology, climate change, and resource management: can the past still inform the future? 46Hugh D. Safford, Gregory D. Hayward, Nicole E. Heller, and John A. Wiens5 What is the scope of “history” in historical ecology? Issues of scale in management and conservation 63John A. Wiens, Hugh D. Safford, Kevin Mcgarigal, William H. Romme, and Mary Manning6 Native Americans, ecosystem development, and historical range of variation 76Gregory J. Nowacki, Douglas W. Maccleery, and Frank K. Lake7 Conservation and resource management in a changing world: extending historical range of variation beyond the baseline 92Stephen T. JacksonSection 3 Modeling Historic Variation and Its Application For Understanding Future Variability 111Robert E. Keane8 Creating historical range of variation (HRV) time series using landscape modeling: overview and issues 113Robert E. Keane9 Modeling historical range of variability at a range of scales: an example application 128Kevin Mcgarigal and William H. RommeSection 4 Case Studies of Applications 147Gregory D. Hayward10 Regional application of historical ecology at ecologically defined scales: forest ecosystems in the Colorado Front Range 149Thomas T. Veblen, William H. Romme, and Claudia Regan11 Incorporating concepts of historical range of variation in ecosystem-based management of British Columbia’s coastal temperate rainforest 166Andy Mackinnon and Sari C. Saunders12 Incorporating HRV in Minnesota national forest land and resource management plans: a practitioner’s story 176Mary Shedd, Jim Gallagher, Michael Jiménez, and Duane Lula13 Applying historical fire-regime concepts to forest management in the western United States: three case studies 194Thomas E. Demeo, Frederick J. Swanson, Edward B. Smith, Steven C. Buttrick, Jane Kertis, Jeanne Rice, Christopher D. Ringo, Amy Waltz, Chris Zanger, Cheryl A. Friesen, and John H. Cissel14 Using historical ecology to inform wildlife conservation, restoration, and management 205Beth A. Hahn and John L. Curnutt15 River floodplain restoration experiments offer a window into the past 218Ramona O. Swenson, Richard J. Reiner, Mark Reynolds, and Jaymee Marty16 Streams past and future: fluvial responses to rapid environmental change in the context of historical variation 232Daniel A. Auerbach, N. Leroy Poff, Ryan R. Mcshane, David M. Merritt, Matthew I. Pyne, and Thomas K. Wilding17 A framework for applying the historical range of variation concept to ecosystem management 246William H. Romme, Gregory D. Hayward, and Claudia ReganSection 5 Global Perspectives 263John A. Wiens18 Ecological history guides the future of conservation: lessons from Africa 265A.R.E. Sinclair19 Ecological history has present and future ecological consequences – case studies from Australia 273David Lindenmayer20 A view from the past to the future 281Keith J. Kirby21 Is the historical range of variation relevant to rangeland management? 289Brandon T. Bestelmeyer22 Knowing the Fennoscandian taiga: ecohistorical lessons 297Yrjö HailaSection 6 Challenges for the Future 30523 Reflections on the relevance of history in a nonstationary world 307Julio L. Betancourt24 The growing importance of the past in managing ecosystems of the future 319Hugh D. Safford, John A. Wiens, and Gregory D. HaywardIndex 329

“The book provides a rich summary and critique of such ideas and approaches that will provide material both for under-graduate courses and for ecologists interested in the theory and practice of understanding historical ecological dynamics.”  (Ecological Management & Restoration, 18 May 2015)“But each chapter provides guidance on how historical ecology may be fruitfully applied to specific cases of management giving the reader much hope for the future and for potential course corrections on the landscape.”  (Landscape Ecol, 15 January 2015)"Overall, a very useful reference for advanced students in conservation and ecosystem management as well as researchers and managers developing future adaptation plans.  Summing Up: Highly recommended.  Upper-division undergraduates and above.”   (Choice, 1 March 2013)