Workshop Coordinators:
Lenya Quinn-Davidson, University of California Cooperative Extension and Northern California Prescribed Fire Council
Will Harling, Mid Klamath Watershed Council
Eli Asarian, Riverbend Sciences
Zeke Lunder, The Lookout
Damon Goodman, California Trout
Josh Smith, The Watershed Research & Training Center
 

In recent decades, it has become increasingly clear that the West suffers simultaneously from too much fire and not enough. Fire exclusion has created vulnerable landscapes, far departed from the fire regimes through which they evolved. Losses are multifaceted: unprecedented high-severity fire is causing widespread forest loss, while other systems wither in the absence of needed fire. The effects of fire on fish are equally complex. There are direct impacts—retardant drops and dozer lines in streams, post-fire debris flows and fish kills, erosion, loss of riparian cover—but there are indirect connections that also require attention. Fire can improve streamflow, stream temperatures, and inputs like gravel and wood, providing many unrealized opportunities for alignment between the two fields. Likewise, fire management has largely failed to account for fish, and nascent approaches in fire planning should work to identify areas of overlap and mutual benefit. In this era, which some call the Pyrocene, process-based restoration for fish will necessarily involve fire as a process. This workshop will explore the many dimensions of fire and fish, including fire ecology for fisheries, impacts of fire on fish, opportunities for joint projects and policy, and a shared vision and strategy for healthier fire and healthier fish.
 

Fire and Water: The Essentials of Life, Margo Robbins, Cultural Fire Management Council
 

Fire and Landscape Change in California: Lessons From Fire History, Carl Skinner, Retired USDA Forest Service Pacific Southwest Research Station
 

Fish and Fire - Big Picture, Gordon Reeves, Oregon State University
 

An Exploration of Fish and Fire in California, Damon H. Goodman, California Trout
 

Fire and Smoke Effects on Water Temperature: Fine Most of the Time, Eli Asarian, Riverbend Sciences
 

Toxicity of Fire Retardants to Chinook Salmon with Different Life Histories as Fry and Smolts, Joseph Dietrich, NOAA Fisheries – Northwest Fisheries Science Center
 

McKinney Fire Debris Flows and the 2022 Klamath River Fish Kill, Toz Soto, Karuk Tribe
 

Food Webs of 10 lakes Before and After a Mega-Wildfire, Christine Parisek, UC Davis
 

Preparing Fish for Fire: Thoughts from the Modoc Sucker, Stewart Reid, Western Fishes
 

Integrated Meadows Restoration and Fuels Reduction in the Sierra Nevada to Manage Carbon and Water Stocks and Protect Native Trout, Sandi Jacobson, California Trout
 

Observations from the Fireline, Josh Smith, Watershed Research and Training Center
 

Strategic Post-fire Stream and Meadow Restoration to Benefit Aquatic Diversity, Karen Pope, USDA Forest Service, Pacific Southwest Research Station
 

Restoring Instream and Upslope Processes in the Western Klamath Mountains to Bring our Salmon Home and Put an End to Megafires, Will Harling, Mid Klamath Watershed Council
 

Using Fire to Change Hearts, Minds, Policies, and Landscapes, Lenya Quinn-Davidson, University of California Cooperative Extension