Wildland Fire Reference Resources

Literature Databases and Bibliographies

In addition to the following databases and bibliographies you may want to search databases listed in Articles and Datatases: Forestry.

• Bibliographies on Chaparral and the Fire Ecology of Other Mediterranean Systems (Keeley) 1988 (California Water Resources Center Report #69) (TD 224 C3 C3 No.69)
• Effects of Fire on Forests: A Bibliography (US Forest Service Library) 1938 (Docs A 13.2 F51/25) Includes 605 references arranged by subject.
• Environmental Effects of Postfire Logging: Literature Review and Annotated Bibliography (McIver and Starn) 2000 (US Forest Service General Technical Report PNW-486) (print copy available in Docs A 13.88:PNW-486)
• Fire: A Summary of Literature in the United States from the Mid-1920s to 1966 (Cushwa) 1968 (Docs A 13.62:13-2 F51) Includes 823 references categorized by broad topic.
• Fire Ecology Database (Tall Timbers Research Station) Covers a broad range of fire-related information with emphasis on North America, and in particular, the southeastern US. Includes over 26,000 references to books, chapters within books, journal articles, conference papers, state and federal documents. Search by author, keywords, periodical, year, or title. A thesaurus is available to assist in keyword searches.
• Fire History and Climate Change (Sommers) Includes over 1200 references gathered for the Synthesis of Knowledge: Fire History and Climate Change.
• Fire in North American Wetland Ecosystems and Fire-Wildlife Relations: An Annotated Bibliography (Kirby, Lewis and Sexon) 1988 (print copy available in Docs I 49.89/2: 88 (1)) (US Fish and Wildlife Service Biological Report 88 (1)) Searchable bibliography containing 300 references on fire in North American wetland ecosystems and a subject index of all fire-related literature that has appeared in Wildlife Review
• Fire Research Institute Library (Fire Research Institute) Contains over 110,000 wildland fire literature references.
• Fire Science Bibliography (California Fire Science Consortium) Includes over 1,700 citations of scientific articles relating to fire ecology and management in the western United States, many of which are specific to California. The bibliography is currently in .XML format. The bibliography can be downloaded and then imported into Endnote, Mendeley, Zotero and other citation-management software programs. You can use your citation-management software to search the collection by keyword, author, date, or any other field you choose, to find citations relevant to your interests. A more extensive bibliography covering central and southern California is also available.
• FIREDOC (US National Institute for Standards and Technology, Building and Fire Research Laboratory) Includes over 80,000 references in the Fire Research Information Services database. Topics covered include wildland fire.
• Forest Fire Research in California: An Annotated Bibliography, 1923-1961 (Wilson & Nilsson) 1962 (Pacific Southwest Forest and Range Experiment Station Miscellaneous Paper No. 75) (Docs A 13.62/9:75)
• FRAMES (Fire Research and Management Exchange System) Resource Catalog (Wildland Fire Science Partnership) Database containing references and tools (software) about fire research and management resources. FRAMES contains more than 11,000 records and also accesses an additional 26,000 references from the Fire Ecology Database. One can search by specific topic or search the entire database at once.
• Linking Wilderness Research and Management-Volume 1. Wilderness Fire Restoration and Management: an Annotated Reading List (Hourdequin and Wright) (2001) (USFS Gen. Tech. Rep. RMRS-GTR-79-VOL 1) (print copy available in Docs A13.88:RMRS-79 Vol 1) Lists key literature relating to fire restoration and management in wilderness and similarly protected areas.
• References on the American Indian Use of Fire in Ecosystems (Williams) 2003. Contains over 1,000 citations to books and papers about anthropogenic fire.
• Selected Fire References Related to the Sierra Nevada (Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks Fire Information Cache) References are categorized by "General Literature/Information", "Technical & Scientific Literature" and "Historic & Background Literature". Concentration is on Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks and the southern Sierra Nevada but also includes other fire related references that may be of general interest. Papers are listed by date within each section.
• Wildland-Urban Interface Fire Citations (Discus) 2012. Extensive 51-page bibliography of research citations organized into nine sections: 1) Wildland fuels; 2) Landscaping fuels; 3) Construction; 4) Community Planning; 5) Social; 6) Policy and economics; 7) Fire suppression; 8) Post-fire recovery; and 9) Case studies.

Literature Reviews

• Ecological Effects of Prescribed Fire Season: a Literature Review and Synthesis for Managers (Knapp, Estes and Skinner) 2009 (USFS General Technical Report PSW-GTR-224) Compares and synthesizes 350 studies on the historical and prescribed fire regimes for different regions in the continental United States in relation to season of prescribed burning and its potential adverse effects on vegetation and wildlife.
• Effect of Wildland Fire on Aquatic Ecosystems in the Western USA (Young, Gresswell, and Luce) 2003 Forest Ecology and Management Vol 178 (1-2) (HSU users only) Reviews the state of knowledge on fire effects on aquatic ecosystems.
• Fire Effects Information System (US Forest Service. Rocky Mountain Research Station Fire Sciences Laboratory) Database that provides a synopses of the fire effects on 900 plant species, 100 animal species, and 16 Kuchler plant communities found on the North American continent. Each entry includes information on taxonomy, distribution, basic biology, and ecology along with references to pertinent literature.
• Global Forest Fire Assessment 1990-2000 (Goldammer and Mutch) 2001. Includes global, regional and national national fire assessment reports. Prepared in conjunction with FAO's 2000 Global Forest Resources Assessment.
• Synthesis of Knowledge Reports..... Series of reports sponsored by the Joint Fire Science Program which funds scientific research on wildland fires. Search "synthesis" in the search box on the home page. You will find wildland fire synthesis reports related to climate change, woody biomass removal, extreme fire behavior, understory vegetation, wildlife and other topics.
• Wildland Fire in Ecosystems (U.S. Forest Service) 2000-2008 (Docs A 13.88: RMRS-42 vol 1-5) (USFS General Technical Report RMRS-GTR-42) Six volume state-of-the-knowledge review emphasizing the principles and processes that influence the effects of fire on ecosystems in the United States and Canada. Updates the earlier review series prepared in the 1970's. The six volumes in the "Rainbow Series" include 1) Effects of Fire on Fauna, 2) Effects of Fire on Flora, 3) Effects of Fire on Cultural Resources and Archeology, 4) Effects of Fire on Soil and Water, 5) Effects of Fire on Air and 6) Fire and Nonnative Invasive Plants
• Wilderness Fire Science: a State of Knowledge Review (Agee), pp. 5-22, IN Cole, McCool, Borrie and O'Loughlin (2000) Wilderness science in a time of change conference-Volume 5: Wilderness ecosystems, threats, and management; 1999 May 23-27; Missoula, MT. (USFS RMRS-P-15-VOL-5) Reviews progress in wilderness fire science and management since Kilgore's 1986 review.

Handbooks and Manuals

• Fire Management Toobox (Arthur Carhart National Wilderness Training Center and Wilderness.net) Provides wilderness managers with information, guidelines, manuals and other resources about managing fire in wilderness.
• "Fire Management" (Barney and others), pp. 189-251 IN Forestry Handbook (Wenger) 1984 (ref SD 373 F58 1984)

Maps

• Fire Weather (US National Weather Service)
• FIRMS: Fire Information for Resource Management System (NASA Earth Observing System Data and Information System) Integrates remote sensing and GIS technologies to deliver current global MODIS fire locations and burned area information.
• GeoMac (Geospatial Multi-Agency Coordination Group) Interactive mapper shows the location of active fires, the current perimeter of active fires, and burn areas.
• Maps (National Interagency Fire Center) Links to a variety of wildfire related maps.
• MODIS Active Fire Mapping Program (US Forest Service) Provides a near real-time geospatial overview of the current wildland fire situation at regional and national scales. NASA’s Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) is the primary remote sensing data source for this program.
• Real Time Fire-Weather Intelligence & Smoke Forecast for the Western USA (USFS Rocky Mountain Research Station Rocky Mountain Center) Provides real-time delivery of fire-weather intelligence and smoke forecasts for the Western US. The website supplies hourly information about current and future values of weather elements such as air temperature, relative humidity, precipitation, cloud cover, wind speed and wind direction, as well as several fire indices. Information is delivered in the form of interactive 2-D maps, point observations & point forecasts.
• Wildland Fire Assessment System (WFAS) Maps (US Forest Service)

Photographs

• BLM Photo Library (US Bureau of Land Managment)
• Find-a-Photo (US Forest Service)
• Forest History Society Photograph Collection
• Wildland Fire Photos (Wildlandfire.com)