Cycles of research at fort valley, arizona, our first forest experiment station

Abstract

We present a history of the origin and development of long-term, place-based research at Fort Valley, Arizona, site of the first experiment station established by the USDA Forest Service. Initially named the Coconino Experiment Station, this field laboratory was founded to solve a crucial problem with ponderosa pine reforestation and to institute a federal research program in forest science. The laboratory was soon renamed the Fort Valley Experiment Station and later designated along with its forest tracts as the Fort Valley Experimental Forest (FVEF). The science program at Fort Valley has proceeded through three cycles of research, each consisting of problem recognition, investigation, resolution, and incorporation into subsequent work. Fundamental investigations in silvics began in the first research cycle and broadened in the second cycle to integrate practical knowledge in silviculture, ecology, and related fields for improving resource management. The principal research objective in the present third cycle is to provide the scientific basis of restoration and forest health projects for managing ecosystems at a landscape scale. A common theme across these cycles has been ponderosa pine and its ecological interactions with climate and disturbance. From cycle to cycle, however, the scope of that theme has expanded from regenerating trees, to interacting biotic communities, to functioning ecosystems. The next cycle of research at FVEF will need to develop adaptive and mitigation strategies for responding to new environmental and resource crises. This research will require better integration of ecological and evolutionary perspectives through such approaches as ecosystem genomics. FVEF could contribute to this research by conducting innovative, manipulative experiments, enhancing physical and management infrastructures, and compiling long-term records of climate, disturbance, and vegetation responses.