{"id":67735,"date":"2023-01-11T10:07:37","date_gmt":"2023-01-11T17:07:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/?p=67735"},"modified":"2023-01-11T10:07:37","modified_gmt":"2023-01-11T17:07:37","slug":"srp-2022","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/srp-2022\/","title":{"rendered":"Protecting our water: SRP-funded projects take on challenges of snowpack, watershed health\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

In northern Arizona, snowpack is the difference between drought and no drought, so finding ways to increase snowpack in the forest matters.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The Salt River Project (SRP), through a partnership with Northern Arizona University, funds research projects that aim to support the identification of solutions that squeeze all the benefits out of winter snow and protect priority watersheds in Arizona. This partnership is in its sixth year and continues to answer critical questions and yield power and water-related solutions across Arizona. \u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Learn more about the SRP-funded projects:<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"AStudying the relationship of forest thinning and moisture<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n

Teki Sankey<\/span><\/b>, an associate professor in the School of Informatics, Computing, and Cyber Systems (SICCS), built on research demonstrating that forest thinning treatments, which are essential for fire response, can lead to significant differences in how much snow sticks around in higher elevation. Using time-series images of recently thinned forests captured by drones, she found that snowpack distribution and accumulation on the ground can be improved via forest thinning, meaning more snow melts more slowly into the spring season, resulting in improved soil moisture. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

She also analyzed the soil moisture in the drought periods between April 1 and the start of monsoon season in 2019, 2020 and 2021 with similar findings\u2014tailored thinning can be used to promote soil moisture stability using specific tree density and size parameters.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOur results indicate that the prolonged regional drought has had important effects on forest soil moisture, but significantly drier conditions are found in denser forest patches compared to the thinned forest,\u201d Sankey said. \u201cDuring the extreme drought period in 2021, our analysis revealed that thinning improves forest resiliency to drought.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Protecting the water in C.C. Cragin Reservoir\u00a0<\/span><\/b><\/h3>\n

\"C.C.<\/p>\n

Ecological Restoration Institute (ERI) director <\/span>Andrew S\u00e1nchez Meador<\/span><\/b> and ERI research associate <\/span>Merideth Reiser<\/span><\/b> explored how new technologies can improve forest restoration in the water of the C.C. Cragin Reservoir, which is on the Mogollon Rim near Payson. They used lidar, a remote sensing method that uses light to measure the Earth\u2019s surface, to examine the role of dead and downed trees in the forest ecosystem. These are a complicated part of the forest\u2014they are important in fire behavior, but too many can be dangerous, harbor invasive insects and require burning in slash piles, which is bad for forest health\u2014and watershed health\u2014but often still the best option.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

S\u00e1nchez Meador and Reiser wanted to know if there was a better way to handle dead and downed trees. They\u2019re comparing how different lidar detection methods can measure dead wood in the forests around the reservoir.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThese forests on the Mogollon Rim are the testing grounds to explore how remote sensing can be used to improve forest restoration,\u201d Reiser said. \u201cBetter forest restoration means more reliable water.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In northern Arizona, snowpack is the difference between drought and no drought, so finding ways to increase snowpack in the forest matters.\u00a0 The Salt River Project (SRP), through a partnership with Northern Arizona University, funds research projects that aim to support the identification of solutions that squeeze all the benefits out of winter snow and…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":67743,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-67735","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-research-academics"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67735","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67735"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67735\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67743"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67735"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67735"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67735"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}