Publications

This study investigates patterns of plant diversity following wildfires in fire‐prone shrublands of California, seeks to understand those patterns in terms of both local and landscape factors, and considers the implications for fire management. Ninety study sites were established following extensive wildfires in 1993, and 1000‐m2 plots were used to sample a variety of parameters. Data on...

No abstract available at this time

Climate in low-latitude wintering areas may influence temperate and high-latitude breeding populations of birds, but demonstrations of such relationships have been rare because of difficulties in linking wintering with breeding populations. We used long-term aerial surveys in Mexican wintering areas and breeding areas in Alaska, USA, to assess numbers of Black Brant (Branta bernicla...

Historically, the role of parasites in ecosystem functioning has been considered trivial because a cursory examination reveals that their relative biomass is low compared with that of other trophic groups. However there is increasing evidence that parasite-mediated effects could be significant: they shape host population dynamics, alter interspecific competition, influence energy flow...

To elucidate broad-scale environmental controls of coniferous forest reproduction in the Sierra Nevada, California, we monitored reproduction for 5 years in 47 plots arrayed across a steep elevational (climatic) gradient. We found that both absolute seedling densities (stems

Postfire resprouting by woody plants confers a marked advantage in rate of recovery over species that regenerate entirely from seed. However, the predictability of this advantage varies markedly between species, with some showing nearly 100% rootcrown survival and others often much lower. This study examined patterns of fire-caused mortality and tested the relative importance of fire...

No abstract available.

As a federally threatened species, the desert tortoise's (Gopherus agassizii) recovery is required under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). According to the criteria established by the Desert Tortoise Recovery Plan (U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service 1994) for delisting the tortoise from ESA protection, the species as a whole will be considered recovered when tortoises have exhibited a...

This chapter investigates the South Coast bioregion in Southern California. There are two broad ecological zones: the coastal valleys and foothill zone and the montane zone. Grasslands are resilient to a wide range of fire frequencies. Fire regimes in big-cone Douglas-fir forests vary spatially and temporally. Lodgepole pine forests are at the highest end of the elevational gradient for...

No abstract available at this time

The Mojave Desert, which lies between the Great Basin Desert in the north and the Sonoran Desert in the south, covers an estimated 114 478–130 464 km2 of the south-western United States and includes parts of the states of Nevada, Utah, Arizona, and California, with the amount of land mass dependent on the definition (Fig. 1; Rowlands et al., 1982; McNab and Avers, 1994; Bailey, 1995...

No abstract available at this time