Profitability of Irrigated Improved Pecan Orchards in the Southern Plains

The objective was to determine if an irrigated improved pecan orchard is economical relative to agronomic systems commonly implemented by producers that have access to irrigation. Results show that the improved pecan orchard is more profitable than competitive enterprises after a twenty year time frame, but is sensitive to pecan price, pecan yield and attitude toward risk.Profitability, Irrigated, Pecan, Orchard, Southern Plains, Crop Production/Industries, Farm Management, Land Economics/Use, Production Economics, Risk and Uncertainty,

Working paper 29: Post-wildfire restoration of structure, composition, and function in southwestern ponderosa pine and warm/dry mixed-conifer forests.

During the last several decades, uncharacteristically large wildfires have occurred at an increasing rate in the frequent-fire forests of the western United States (Westerling et al. 2006). These extensive and severely burned forests represent a serious conservation concern and restoration need. Indeed, Fule et al. (2013, p.4) remarked that "large uncharacteristic wildfires pose one of the greatest risks to ecosystem integrity in the 21st century." Such fires may be pushing forests in the western United States toward a "tipping point" that may lead to permanent changes in structure and composition, loss of carbon into the atmosphere and loss of carbon stocks (Hurteau and North 2009, North and Hurteau 2011, Hurteau et al. 2011), and changes in hydrological function (Dore et al. 2012, Adams 2013). Forests degraded by extensive high-severity fire often also exhibit accelerated soil erosion and subsequent loss of soil productivity, expansions or invasions of non-native plant populations, loss of wildlife habitat; damaged watersheds and degraded water quality to connected streams, and/or vegetation type conversions (Figure 1). Federal land management agencies have formally separated post-fire rehabilitation into short-term stabilization and long-term restoration measures. The U.S. Forest Service Burned Area Emergency Response (BAER) program includes well-researched emergency treatments "to stabilize the burned area, protect public health and safety, and reduce the risk of additional damage to valued resources, such as water supply systems, aquatic habitat and roads" (Robichaud 2009). An immediate goal of BAER is to have protection in place prior to the first damage-producing rain event following the fire. Rehabilitation activities are implemented and can be monitored for up to three years after wildfire, and include the repair of facilities and mitigation of land and resources that are unlikely to recover on their own (Robichaud 2009). Longer-term post- fire restoration efforts have generally received much less attention, although the increasing occurrence of very large wildfires has prompted more attempts to articulate and evaluate long-term strategies (Long et al. in press). As opposed to emergency rehabilitation, ecological restoration focuses on assisting the recovery of characteristic ecological structure, process, and function. This requires an understanding of natural ranges of variability for these key attributes as well as development of reference conditions to guide management activities (Egan and Howell 2001, Margolis et al. 2013). In addition, restoration activities demand long-term commitment and evaluation. However, given the altered conditions that sometimes follow high-severity fires in previously degraded forests, successful restoration to a desired state may be difficult and costly (Scheffer et al. 2001). This working paper describes the goals of post-wildfire forest restoration, identifies the unique challenges and opportunities for management of severely burned large patches, and develops principles for restoring forests that have been burned by high-severity wildfires

Research for the Development of Guidelines for Conducting and Analyzing an Environmental Water Quality Study to Determine Statistically Meaningful Results

This report presents and discusses the basic statistical models and methods which are useful to researchers in the field of water resources research, as well as in other fields. These models and methods are presented from the standpoint of type (parametric and nonparametric - or distribution free) and purpose (e.g., simultaneous comparison of several means, comparison of two or more variances, establishment of a difference between two means with a specified confidence, etc.). The material is presented with emphasis primarily upon methodology, including the necessary assumptions upon which each model is based. No derivations or proofs are given, since these are found in numerous textbooks on statistics readily accessible to the reader. Emphasis is also placed upon the need for the researcher to determine before obtaining data the type of statistical model and analysis required, so that he can use that model or method which is most powerful, and so that he will have the proper data to permit the most efficient analysis. Failure to carry out such preliminary planning relevant to the selection and application of a statistical model will almost always result in either a lack of sufficient relevant data or in the gathering of extraneous data, either of which is unnecessarily costly. Each method is illustrated by an example, together with an interpretation of the result

Michigan at the National Educational Association

Booklet concerning Michigan at the National Educational Association, as well as a notecard from D. W. Springer concerning the Boston meeting