Increasing giant sequoia reforestation success after catastrophic wildfire using soil and microbial indicatorsproject dates: 9 1 2024 8 31 2027AWARD purpose: giant sequoias are AWE-inspiring trees…

This $245,350 Cooperative Agreement award from the U.S. Geological Survey's National and Regional Climate Adaptation Science Centers (CFDA 15.820) program aims to study the effectiveness of using soil and microbial inoculants to improve the growth and survival of giant sequoia seedlings planted in severely burned groves in national parks and forests.

The project has three key objectives: 1) Identify how wildfire alters soil conditions and microbial communities in sequoia groves, 2) Coordinate with the National Park Service to plant sequoia seedlings with different soil and microbial treatments, and 3) Assess the effectiveness of these propagation methods in improving seedling growth and survival over one year. The University of Washington is the primary awardee and expects to produce three scientific publications, one digital product integrated with the NPS app, and a final factsheet summarizing the project's findings on optimal soil and microbial management strategies for sequoia reforestation. The project period runs from September 1, 2024 to August 31, 2027.

Activities

To meet these aims, the project first will identify the soil conditions, soil microorganisms, and seedling-associated microorganisms altered by wildfire. This activity involves harvesting, collecting, and analyzing the chemistry and microbial communities in soils and seedlings in a reference forest (i.e., not burned in 2020 2021 wildfires), moderately burned groves, and severely burned groves. Next, the recipient will coordinate with the NPS s planned reforestation efforts of severely burned groves to propagate and then plant sequoia seedlings with combinations of different potting materials (burned soil, reference soil) and microbial inoculants. To directly link these manipulations during seedling propagation to the effectiveness of this potential management strategy, the recipient will assess seedling growth and survival one year following planting, and then analyze soil chemistry and microbial communities associated with the treatment seedlings.deliverables and expected outcomes: the recipient expects to produce three scientific publications, one digital product integrated with the NPS APP, and a final factsheet and report outlining our classification of giant sequoia groves based on terrain indices of soil moisture, changes in soil and microbial communities as a function of wildfire severity, and the effectiveness of microbial and soil inoculants for improving seedling success and a function of landscape position. Publications will include data and metadata releases in publicly available digital data repositories. Evaluations of seedling survival as a function of landscape classifications, which can be derived from readily available gridded datasets, will allow the projects findings to be applied to other sequoia groves, and therefore are useful to other sequoia land managers. The project will use presentations and forums to solicit input from other land managers at the start of the study to facilitate CO-production of knowledge, and presentations and factsheets at the conclusion of the project to communicate project results. The recipient expects this project will provide land managers with knowledge on the effectiveness a new potential sequoia RE-planting strategy of manipulating soil and microbial conditions during propagation as a function of the terrain in burned sequoia groves.intended beneficiary(IES): sequoia land managers, scientific communities, fire managers