Fire in the House of Water: Monitoring the Impact of Anthropogenic Wildfire on Native Forest in West Maui
| dc.contributor.advisor | Friday, James B | |
| dc.contributor.author | Carter, William | |
| dc.contributor.department | Natural Resources and Environmental Management | |
| dc.contributor.department | Master's of Environmental Management | |
| dc.contributor.instructor | Idol, Travis | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2024-06-13T20:50:52Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2024-06-13T20:50:52Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2024-05-07 | |
| dc.description | Presentation slideshow and written report | |
| dc.description.abstract | Anthropogenic wildfire has become a dominant threat to Hawaiʻi’s native ecosystems. Shifting land use patterns, human activity, and climate change have resulted in an exponential increase in land area burned across the island chain over the last century. This project addresses the threat that wildfire poses to native forests, using one particular fire as a case study: the Kauaʻula fire that occurred in November 2022 in West Maui. This fire was a result of human ignition in unmanaged invasive grasslands. It burned close to 2,000 acres across various ecological zones and a roughly 3,000 foot elevation gradient into pristine native forest that had never burned in recorded history. This fire overlapped and surpassed a smaller fire that occurred in 2007. The Kauaʻula fire was a particularly extreme example of the well documented grass-fire cycle, considering the extent to which the fire breached into pristine native habitat. In collaboration with the Mauna Kahālāwai Watershed Partnership (MKWP), the goal of this project was to establish a photo monitoring study of the area to show change over time along the elevation gradient of the burn zone, specifically documenting initial ecological succession of native and invasive plant species. Data collection was done 9 months post-fire and 16 months post-fire. Invasive grass species such as Andropogon virginicus, Melinis minutiflora, and other weeds dominated the lower plots, while the upper plots showed a mix of native/invasive re-growth. Much of the new upper elevation burn area remained bare and prone to erosion for the extent of the study. In Hawaiʻi it is critical to have location-specific data to guide management decisions as we continue to adapt to the growing threat of wildfire. The results of this study provide a general timeline of re-growth and invasion trends, suggesting when and where to implement restoration efforts for similar disturbances in the future. | |
| dc.description.course | NREM 696 | |
| dc.identifier.uri | https://hdl.handle.net/10125/108287 | |
| dc.publisher.place | UH Mānoa | |
| dc.subject | Hawaiʻi | |
| dc.subject | wildfire | |
| dc.subject | native ecosystems | |
| dc.subject | grass-fire cycle | |
| dc.subject | monitoring | |
| dc.subject | invasive species | |
| dc.title | Fire in the House of Water: Monitoring the Impact of Anthropogenic Wildfire on Native Forest in West Maui | |
| dc.type | Text | |
| dcterms.extent | 26 | |
| dcterms.language | English | |
| dcterms.publisher | UH Mānoa | |
| dcterms.rights | Creative Commons | |
| dcterms.rightsHolder | Carter, William |