This is Part III in a series of articles on Wildfires in the desert region of Gold Butte in North Eastern Clark County, NV. To read Part II click the following link: Defining the Study Area:
In the field of Spatial Analysis and Statistics you use
geographic data, which is data that has a fixed location within the real world,
to find trends and correlations between the data. The goal of my fire analysis project
is to find try and find correlations between the fire area and the rest of the
gold butte region to create a risk index to identify the most at risk areas in
Gold Butte that haven’t yet burned but are likely to burn. Once this is
complete I will then document those areas current habitat for future
restoration plans. I will also look for ways to protect these desert ecosystems
from the devastating consequences of a wildfire event.
In step 1 I defined the sampling area as the boundary of the
Forks and Tramp fire within the Gold Butte Region and presented the summary five
different datasets including soil, geology, vegetation types and landforms or slope
classifications within the burned area (sample).
In step 2 I defined
the study area to which I would scale my analysis to. I then presented the
summary results of the same datasets that I presented for the sample area in
step 1.
In Step 3 I am looking for recurring patterns and relationships
between the burned area and the total study area. In this step I am looking for
scale invariance or the lack of scale invariance to try and see if I can
determine why the fire burned where it did through analyzing the results of both
step 1 and step 2.
For example, if all of the data from the sample area scaled
perfectly to the study area, all that it would tell me is that this fire burned consistent
with the statistical distribution across the total study area. If 30 percent of the study area was made up of
creosote and 30 percent of the burn area was also creosote the only inference that
could be made is that the fire burned consistent with the overall makeup of the
study area. However if 30 percent of the study area was made up of creosote but
5 percent of the burn area consisted of creosote then we could deduce that the
creosote vegetation is not as susceptible to fire. The following is the breakdown of the
previously defined data:
Landform (Slope
Classifications)
Looking at the total Landform distribution across the entire
study area you can see that the gently sloping ridges and hills make up the
majority of the study area. However that same classification only makes up 20%
of the burn area meaning that this landform classification is not as
susceptible to fire as other types. The
landform types that have the smallest percent of the total study area but the
largest percentage of the burn area are the indicators of the most susceptible landform
types:
·
very dry steep slopes
·
very moist steep slopes
·
hot aspect scarps, cliffs, canyons
·
cool aspect scarps, cliffs, canyons
Geologic Types
Again here I
am looking for the geologic types that have the smallest percent of the total
study area but the largest percentage of the burn area. The most susceptible geologic types:
·
very dry steep slopes
·
very moist steep slopes
·
hot aspect scarps, cliffs, canyons
·
cool aspect scarps, cliffs, canyons
Soil Types
After analyzing
the soil types the indicators are not as significant as other data is at
showing correlation however there are still relationships that exist that will
help add to the modeling. Again I am looking for the types that have the
smallest percent of the total study area but the largest percentage of the burn
area. The most susceptible soil types
are:
·
Water (this is the land that has been exposed by
the drop in lake water levels)
·
lithic torriorthents-rock outcrop-lithic and
deep calciorthids
·
deep and shallow
paleorthids-calciorthids-haplargids
Vegetation Types
Again I am looking for the types that have the smallest
percent of the total study area but the largest percentage of the burn area. The most susceptible Vegetation types are:
·
Artemisia tridentata ssp. (tridentata,
wyomingensis) – This type was only found
in burn area
·
Inter-Mountain Basins Montane Sagebrush Steppe
·
Great Basin Pinyon-Juniper Woodland
·
Inter-Mountain Basins Big Sagebrush Shrubland
·
Agriculture-Cultivated Crops and Irrigated
Agriculture
·
Mojave Mid-Elevation Mixed Desert Scrub
Vegetation 2
Again I am looking for the types that have the smallest
percent of the total study area but the largest percentage of the burn area. The most susceptible Vegetation types are:
·
Juniper II
·
Mountain shrub
·
Blackbrush
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