Fire suppression and other factors have resulted in high wildfire risk in the western US, and prescribed burning can be an effective tool for thinning forests and reducing fuels to lessen wildfire risks. However, prescribed burning sometimes fails to substantially reduce fuels and sometimes damages and kills valuable, large trees.

There is considerable interest in evaluating whether recent wildfires in dry conifer forests of western North America are burning with uncharacteristic severity—that is, with a severity outside the historical range of variability.

Fire severity maps are an important tool for understanding fire effects on a landscape. The relative differenced normalized burn ratio (RdNBR) is a commonly used severity index in California forests, and is typically divided into four categories: unchanged, low, moderate, and high.

Since Euro-American settlement, ponderosa pine forests throughout the western United States have shifted from high fire frequency and open canopy savanna forests to infrequent fire and dense, closed canopy forests. Managers at Zion National Park, USA, reintroduced fire to counteract these changes and decrease the potential for high-severity fires.

Periodic fire is thought to improve whitebark pine (Pinus albicaulis Engelm.) regeneration by reducing competition and creating openings, but the mechanisms by which fire affects seedling establishment are poorly understood.

Projected effects of climate change across many ecosystems globally include more frequent disturbance byfire and reduced plant growth due to warmer (and especially drier) conditions.

Forests dominated by Douglas-fir and western hemlock in the Pacific Northwest of the United States have strongly influenced concepts and policy concerning old-growth forest conservation.

Opinions about public lands and the actions of private non-industrial forest owners in the western United States play important roles in forested landscape management as both public and private forests face increasing risks from large wildfires, pests and disease.

Some tick populations have increased dramatically in the past several decades leading to an increase in the incidence and emergence of tick-borne diseases. Management strategies that can effectively reduce tick populations while better understanding regional tick phenology is needed. One promising management strategy is prescribed burning.

Wildfires bring stark attention to interactions among climate change, fire, forests, and livelihoods, prompting urgent calls for change from policy-makers and the public.