200 WJAF 15(4) 2000 Forest Service Spatial Information Use for Planning Prescribed Fires T.M. Barrett, School of Forestry, University of Montana, Missoula, MT 59812; J.G. Jones, Rocky Mountain Research Station, USDA Forest Service, P.O. Box 8089, Missoula, MT 59801; and R.H. Wakimoto, School of Forestry, University of Montana, Missoula, MT 59812. ABSTRACT: Forest management decision support systems (FMDSS) and geographic information systems have improved the incorporation of spatial information into forest planning. However, most FMDSS have been designed to implement silvicultural treatments rather than prescribed fire and fuel treatments. Results from a survey of 277 Forest Service employees in the western US show FMDSS need modifications to be better adapted to the needs of prescribed fire planners. Survey responses indicate that, on average, prescribed fire planners would like to increase the area treated annually by 12 times current levels. Available time windows for burning provide the most severe constraint for managers, while funding and personnel constraints were rated as comparably less important. Given these results, FMDSS may be most appropriately designed to help managers develop a long-term strategy for prioritizing prescribed fire treatments. Necessary FMDSS modifications may include different methods of delineating treatment boundaries, improved integration with wildlife habitat models, emphasis on short-term costs, and flexible intervals between repeated treatments. West. J. Appl. For. 15(4):200–207. When the U.S. federal wildland fire management policy and program was recently reviewed, the guiding principles included recommendations that fire, and management of fire, be integrated into the existing land management planning process (USDI and USDA 1996). One reason for the diffi- culty of incorporating prescribed fire and fuel treatments into forest planning is that fire processes are not only stochastic but spatial in nature. The exclusion of spatial information has been given as a cause for past failures in U.S. national forest planning (Franklin 1994). In recent years, the promise of incorporating spatial considerations into overall forest plan- ning has been greatly enhanced by the development of forest management decision support systems (FMDSS) that are either inherently spatially based or can be linked to geo- graphic information systems (GIS). In the United States, such forest management decision support systems include UTOOLS (Ager and McGaughey 1997), TEAMS (Wood and Dewhurst 1998) , SPECTRUM (EMAC 1996), SNAP (Ses- sions et al. 1997), MAGIS (Zuuring et al. 1995), and a number of other systems that vary widely in complexity, cost, and purpose (Mowrer 1997). FMDSS are computer programs used to help understand the consequences of different alternatives for managing for- ests. FMDSS allow users to simulate the scheduling of NOTE: T.M. Barrett is the corresponding author and can be reached at (406) 243-6459 and tara@forestry.umt.edu. This research was supported in part by the Rocky Mountain Research Station (USDA Forest Service) and the McIntire-Stennis program. Copyright © 2000 by the Society of American Foresters. various management activities (silvicultural activities; pre- scribed burning; and sometimes road building, maintenance, and closure), along with possible cumulative ecological, social, and economic effects for the resulting future land- scapes. The recently released Committee of Scientists’ report refers to this process as one of “visualizing alternative fu- tures” and suggests that such computer-based analyses can contribute to collaborative planning (COS 1999). Although the development of GIS and spatially based FMDSS could provide needed links between planning for prescribed fire and planning for other activities, these programs may need modification. In general, most FMDSS heavily emphasize silvicultural treatments. FMDSS that are suitable for planning silvicultural treat- ments may not be suitable for planning prescribed fire treat- ments. Including prescribed fire treatments might require modifications if prescribed fire managers use different types of spatial information, face different types of constraints, require different techniques for spatial patterning of treat- ments, or have different GIS needs and capabilities. Developers of FMDSS and related spatial planning tools need some basic knowledge about the use of spatial informa- tion by those people charged with planning and implementa- tion of prescribed fire programs. However, such knowledge is currently lacking. To address this problem, in the fall of 1997 we surveyed those people who implement the USDA Forest Service’s prescribed fire program in the west (Regions 1–6). Three types of questions were included in the survey. The first set of questions focused on factors used to choose Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/wjaf/article/15/4/200/4741266 by guest on 12 February 2022