Fort Hood Project

Prescribed Fire and Habitat Management

Most vegetation types in North America evolved in the presence of fire, and fire exclusion, along with urban development and incompatible forms of agricultural land use, constitutes a major threat to biodiversity in many ecoregions across the United States. Restoration of fire to its former place as an ecosystem process in natural systems is thus a goal of The Nature Conservancy in many different landscapes. On Fort Hood, fire maintains grassland and shrubland communities in balance with woodlands, providing habitat for the full range of diversity, including the black-capped vireo and a host of other fire-adapted species.

Conservancy managers provide expertise and manpower to Fort Hood’s prescribed burning program. During the 2003-04 fire season, Conservancy employees helped Fort Hood apply fire to over 20,000 acres of the installation. Prescribed burning rejuvenates black-capped vireo habitat, restores grassland habitat, helps control Ashe juniper and other woody species in grassland areas where they invade, and removes dangerous fuel accumulations from natural causes and past management activities. For the future, Conservancy scientists are developing a fire prioritization model which will be used on Fort Hood to maximize the effectiveness of the installation’s limited prescribed burning resources.