Forest health monitoring: national status, trends, and analysis 2021

Abstract

The annual national report of the Forest Health Monitoring (FHM) program of the Forest Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, presents forest health status and trends from a national or multistate regional perspective using a variety of sources, introduces new techniques for analyzing forest health data, and summarizes results of recently completed Evaluation Monitoring projects funded through the FHM national program. In this 21st edition in a series of annual reports, national survey data are used to identify recent geographic patterns of insect and disease activity. Satellite data are employed to detect geographic patterns of forest fire occurrence. Recent drought and moisture surplus conditions are compared across the conterminous United States. Data collected by the Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) program are employed to detect regional differences in tree mortality. Fine-scale change in Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) was used to detect broad patterns of forest disturbance across the conterminous United States. Seven recently completed Evaluation Monitoring projects are summarized, addressing forest health concerns at smaller scales.

Titles contained within Forest health monitoring: national status, trends, and analysis 2021

• Introduction
• Broad-scale patterns of insect and disease activity across the 50 United States from the National Insect and Disease Survey, 2020
• Broad-scale patterns of forest fire occurrence across the 50 United States and the Caribbean territories, 2020
• Drought and moisture surplus patterns in the conterminous United States: 2020, 2018–2020, and 2016–2020
• Tree mortality
• Precise mapping of disturbance impacts to U.S. forests using high-resolution satellite imagery
• Monitoring eastern white pine decline and its causes in New England and New York through enhanced survey methods
• Evaluating the effects of nonnative grass invasion on fuels, fire behavior, and tree regeneration in the Central Hardwoods Region
• Ice storm impacts on forest health: monitoring and predicting the growth and mortality of ice-damaged trees in southern forests
• Investigating the extent, severity, and causes of sugarberry mortality in the Southeastern United States
• Ecological consequences of mountain pine beetle outbreaks in the Intermountain West
• Limber pine condition along Montana’s Rocky Mountain Front
• Influences of balsam woolly adelgid and climate on true fir: a baseline for Utah and Montana and a 10-year assessment for Idaho

Keywords

Change detection, disturbance, drought, fire, forest health, forest insects and disease, tree canopy, tree mortality.

Citation

Potter, Kevin M.; Conkling, Barbara L., eds. 2022. Forest health monitoring: national status, trends, and analysis 2021. Gen. Tech. Rep. SRS-266. Asheville, NC: U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service, Southern Research Station. 193 p. https://doi.org/10.2737/SRS-GTR-266.