E&S staff developed a comprehensive assessment of the expected risk to various biological endpoints within all National Forests and wilderness areas of the Intermountain Region. Risk was characterized with critical loads of atmospheric N deposition to protect against species levels of effects on aquatic biota, lichen communities, and individual tree species. Substantial portions of the …

E&S led research describing a modeling study focused on sustainable timber harvesting within the Daniel Boone National Forest (DBNF) has been completed. The VSD+ model was used to evaluate the effects of timber harvesting and historical impacts from acidic deposition on soil nutrient supply at two sites. Results showed that ridgetop locations, and likely other …

E&S recently updated the Ecosystem Management Decision Support (EMDS) system previously developed for the U.S. Forest Service (FS) by E&S and FS staff. Results of model scenarios showed that many southern Appalachian Mountain streams exhibited modest recovery of acid neutralizing capacity (ANC), but soil base saturation is not expected to recover to levels approaching pre-industrial …