Conservation Science at The Nature Conservancy

Lynn M. Decker
Director, U.S. Fire Learning Network

Contact Information
The Nature Conservancy
559 East South Temple
Salt Lake City, UT 84102
Phone: (801) 320-0524
E-mail: ldecker@tnc.org

Website: www.tncfire.org/usfln

Brief Biography
Lynn Decker has been the director of The Nature Conservancy’s Fire Learning Network since 2003. The Network links 60-70 community-based landscape groups across the U.S. and fosters a collaborative science-based process to restore fire adapted ecosystems at ecologically meaningful scales, while managing fuels to abate current threats related to altered fire regimes. Lynn facilitates the design of regional networks and workshops, advises site-based project teams and links them to external sources of support, and communicates regularly with agency staff and other partners about the innovations and learning generated by the network.

Before joining the Conservancy, Lynn worked for 20 years in Forest Service Research and National Forest Systems Management, primarily in the areas of fisheries, aquatic ecology, riparian and watershed science and management. She spent the last three years of this time as an Aquatic Ecologist, working on integrating fisheries and watershed and wildlife concerns into the National Fire Plan.

Education

Master of Science, Wildland Resource Science (Freshwater Ecology Emphasis), 1984, University of California, Berkeley, CA

Bachelor of Science, Wildlife and Fisheries Biology (Fisheries Emphasis), 1979, University of California, Davis, CA

Publication

Thode, Andrea E., Jeffrey L. Kershner, Ken Roby, Lynn M. Decker, and Jan L. Beyers. 2006. Fire, Watershed Resources, and Aquatic Ecosystems. In: Fire in California’s Ecosystems. Neil G. Sugihara, Jan W. van Wagtendonk, Kevin E. Shaffer, Jo Ann Fites-Kaufman, Andrea E. Thode, eds. Berkeley: University of California Press. 612 p.