Skip to Main Content
Pentimento: Fuels reduction and restoration in the Bosque of the Middle Rio GrandeAuthor(s): Deborah M. Finch
Source: Fire Science Brief. 7: 1-6.
Publication Series: Scientific Journal (JRNL)
Station: Rocky Mountain Research Station
PDF: View PDF (688.42 KB)
DescriptionThe Middle Rio Grande of New Mexico is the most extensive, remaining bosque, or cottonwood forest in the southwest. Alterations caused by humans-damming and channeling the river, controlling floods, and planting non-native trees-have disrupted the cycles of the earlier ecosystem. Without periodic flooding, native cottonwoods cannot regenerate. Invasive exotic plants such as Tamarisk, also known as salt cedar, and Russian olive have filled in the gaps and open spaces, increased fuel loads, and continue to replace native trees and shrubs after wildfires. Cottonwoods, not a fire-adapted species, are now at risk from wildfire and replacement by invasive plants.
- You may send email to email@example.com to request a hard copy of this publication.
- (Please specify exactly which publication you are requesting and your mailing address.)
CitationFinch, Deborah M. 2008. Pentimento: Fuels reduction and restoration in the Bosque of the Middle Rio Grande. Fire Science Brief. 7: 1-6.
Keywordsfuels reduction and restoration, Middle Rio Grande, New Mexico, bosque, cottonwood
- Impacts of non-native plant removal on vertebrates along the Middle Rio Grande (New Mexico)
- Displacement of native riparian shrubs by woody exotics: Effects on arthropod and pollinator community composition
- Nest-location and nest-survival of black-chinned hummingbirds in New Mexico: A comparison between rivers with differing levels of regulation and invasion of nonnative plants
XML: View XML