Jonathan W. Long

I am engaged in a variety of projects that integrate research from diverse fields of science to help land managers address important challenges, especially restoring forest and meadow ecosystems in the Western U.S. For these projects, I work with teams of scientists from the Forest Service, universities, and other organizations. I also remain committed to collaborative research with tribes, and I have continued my long-standing collaborative research with the White Mountain Apache Tribe and the Cibecue Community School on restoring wetlands in their mountain homeland in Arizona.

My cooperative research with the White Mountain Apache Tribe has focused on the design and evaluation of restoration treatments for streams and wetlands. I examined how traditional Apache landcare practices and mindsets provide cultural foundations for present-day techniques and philosophies of ecological restoration. Through my work with the Rocky Mountain Research Station, we established a network of 43 monitoring sites on Apache trout streams on the Reservation and the adjacent National Forest. My research has focused on temporal changes in riparian ecosystems, due to both management actions and climatic cycles, including examining inter-related changes in stream morphology, vegetation, fish populations, and hydrology on Southwestern streams. I also authored several papers that explain how habitats for rare species are linked to geologic variation across the Colorado Plateau.

Restoration of wetlands, especially wet meadows, springs, and other headwater systems of ecological and cultural importance.

Post-wildfire impacts and restoration.

Forest restoration and use of fire.

Participatory research and traditional ecological knowledge with tribes and indigenous communities.

Public participation in scientific research.

Ecological monitoring and data management.

Springs and wetlands in the Southwest support are critically important to native peoples and to native plants and wildlife. The long-term network of monitoring sites helps to evaluate impacts of large fires such as the Wallow fire of 2011. Being able to understand landscape and temporal variation improves plans to conserve rare species and restore valuable wetlands. The findings from our research are used in education programs on the Reservation to reinforce traditional ecological knowledge among tribal youth and to prepare them for careers in natural resource management.