Road & Soil Erosion

Unpaved and native surfaced roads are critical in forest management for recreation, wildlife, and timber production. Forest road erosion accounts for the majority of erosion in forestlands. Road management for these forest areas receives increasing pressures to reduce the amount of erosion that occurs on forest roads to create the lowest impact on the environment and to keep our natural world as picturesque and untouched as possible.

While soil erosion is an inevitable and naturally occurring phenomenon, it is greatly accelerated by human interaction. In the future, this could potentially result in degraded water quality considering that forest watersheds are highly valuable in protecting and improving water. Increased land development / land use change can threaten the quality of water that flows through watersheds in the U.S. (Grace, 2008).

Clean Water - Insect Outbreaks and Watersheds

Mountain pine bark beetle outbreaks are causing rapid, unprecedented change in the headwater forests of Western North America. Infestation and mortality currently threaten more than 80% of the basal area of many lodgepole pine dominated stands across the West. In Colorado, bark beetle mortality now exceeds 1.5 million acres and the outbreak is projected to ravage 85 to 90% of the mature lodgepole ecosystems in Colorado and Wyoming within the next five years. The consequences of this extensive canopy disturbance and subsequent management activities will characterize western watersheds and forest landscapes for decades to come.

Briefing Paper | RMRS Hot Topic

Hyporheic Exchange in Gravel Bed Rivers with Pool-Riffle Morphology

Hyporheic exchange (the mixing of streamflow and shallow groundwater) is poorly understood in gravel-bed rivers. These channels are particularly important habitat for salmonids, many of which are currently at risk worldwide and which incubate their offspring within the hyporheic zone.

Briefing Paper