If you are like most people, when you hear about disturbances such as fire, floods, and even human manipulations of the environment you probably feel a little fearful or even sad. We often look at disturbances as destructive. I look at these events as opportunities to test our understanding of ecosystem function and plant community dynamics.
I am first and foremost a botanist. This has allowed me to see how closely the occurrence of both native and non-native plants can be tied to particular disturbances. For example, the Giant Sequoia is serotinous. Serotinous plant species need a cue from the environment to open their cones and release their seeds. This cue is most commonly fire. Fire also creates open patches, free from the shade of other trees. This disturbance is crucial to the species because this tree is shade intolerant, needing full sun to grow. Similarly, cottonwood species need floods to scour vegetation out of a flood zone and create recruitment surfaces so that establishing trees have a place to grow. Flooding at the wrong time of year can mean that the seeds of other species, such as the non-native salt cedar, Tamarix ramosissima, will reach these scoured surfaces before cottonwoods do. A change in the disturbance regime can lead to a change in the vegetation that we observe at any particular location.
My current projects are in the sagebrush steppe of the Intermountain West. The sagebrush steppe has been undergoing a dramatic transformation as plant communities of sagebrush and native perennial grasses are being replaced by monocultures of non-native annual grasses such as cheatgrass, Bromus tectorum and medusahead, Taeniatherium caput-medusae. These annual grasses are changing the fire regime throughout the region by making it more frequent and creating a longer fire season. My work focuses on identifying the factors that allow for the recovery of native plant species and the hindrance of non-native plant species, specifically the previously mentioned non-native annual grasses.
I am first and foremost a botanist. This has allowed me to see how closely the occurrence of both native and non-native plants can be tied to particular disturbances. For example, the Giant Sequoia is serotinous. Serotinous plant species need a cue from the environment to open their cones and release their seeds. This cue is most commonly fire. Fire also creates open patches, free from the shade of other trees. This disturbance is crucial to the species because this tree is shade intolerant, needing full sun to grow. Similarly, cottonwood species need floods to scour vegetation out of a flood zone and create recruitment surfaces so that establishing trees have a place to grow. Flooding at the wrong time of year can mean that the seeds of other species, such as the non-native salt cedar, Tamarix ramosissima, will reach these scoured surfaces before cottonwoods do. A change in the disturbance regime can lead to a change in the vegetation that we observe at any particular location.
My current projects are in the sagebrush steppe of the Intermountain West. The sagebrush steppe has been undergoing a dramatic transformation as plant communities of sagebrush and native perennial grasses are being replaced by monocultures of non-native annual grasses such as cheatgrass, Bromus tectorum and medusahead, Taeniatherium caput-medusae. These annual grasses are changing the fire regime throughout the region by making it more frequent and creating a longer fire season. My work focuses on identifying the factors that allow for the recovery of native plant species and the hindrance of non-native plant species, specifically the previously mentioned non-native annual grasses.
In 2016, I finished my dissertation focusing on the distribution, recovery, and influence of biological soil crusts on native plant communities following fire in the Great Basin. Recent work by the USGS has demonstrated that the presence of biological soil crusts improves site resistance to invasion by non-native annual grasses. I am currently working for the USGS Forest and Rangeland Ecosystem Science Center on the general topics of ecosystems functions provided by biological soil crusts and as well as filling the gaps in our knowledge as to how to effectively incorporate biological soil crusts into restoration plans.