Applications of Bailey's Ecoregions to Military Lands

In collaboration with the noted geographer, Dr. Robert G. Bailey, of the USDA-Forest Service’s Inventory & Monitoring Institute (Ecoregion Studies), the Center for Environmental Management of Military Lands (CEMML), has researched and applied the spatial framework of Bailey’s Ecoregions to the environmental management of Army lands in the fifty United States and to warfighting issues on a global basis. These frameworks have been published in professional journals and presented in various forums to provide insights to Army land managers and warfighters on the need for sustainable management approaches to these vital assets. A list of references and links is provided at the end of this summary.

The premise of these investigations is that through better understanding of the ecological attributes of its diverse training and testing lands, the Army can make more informed decisions about land use, unit stationing and preparation of its units for deployment to areas of conflict, with the synergistic effects of increasing both mission readiness and environmental stewardship.

The U.S. Army manages over 12 million acres of federal and state training lands and testing areas on more than three hundred installations throughout the fifty States. These installations vary in size from tens of acres to millions of contiguous acres, with the largest installations found in the southwestern and western regions of the nation, as well as in Alaska. The locations and physiographic diversity of the Army’s current land inventory is a function of historical precedent, modern-day land expansions and requirements for the strategic projection of forces to other regions of the world. Many Army lands are relatively undeveloped, providing important ecological settings and habitat for a variety of flora and fauna, including many threatened and endangered species.

The map below depicts the distribution and locations of many of these Army installations, superimposed on a map of Bailey’s ecoregions at the Province level of resolution.

CEMML conducted a preliminary study of 31 key Army training and testing installations, representing a total of approximately 10.3 million acres. A breakdown of the selected installations is shown in the Table below:

Installation Name	State	Acres (in Thousands)
TOTALS		10350
Fort Jackson	SC	52
Fort Gordon	GA	55
Schofield Barracks	HI	56
Fort Rucker	AL	58
Fort Leonard Wood	MO	63
Fort Richardson	AK	63
Abderdeen Proving Ground	MD	73
Fort A.P. Hill	VA	76
Fort Lewis	WA	87
Fort Sill	OK	94
Fort Riley	KS	101
Fort Huachuca	AZ	103
Fort Campbell	KY	104
Fort Drum	NY	107
Pohakuloa Training Area	HI	109
Fort Carson	CO	137
Fort Bragg	NC	171
Fort Knox	KY	180
Fort Benning	GA	182
Fort Polk	LA	198
Fort Hood	TX	218
Pinon Canyon Maneuver Site	CO	236
Fort Stewart	GA	279
Yakima Training Center	WA	324
Fort Irwin	CA	643
Fort Greely	AK	661
Dugway Proving Ground	UT	799
Fort Wainwright	AK	915
Fort Bliss	TX	916
Yuma Proving Ground	AZ	1009
White Sands Missile Range	NM	2281

* NOTE: Acreage figures are total installation acres, including cantonment and other areas not directly available for training and testing. Figures are derived from several database sources and may vary depending on recent land surveys or land acquisitions.

Using Bailey’s ecoregional framework and descriptions at the Province level (there are 52 unique Provinces found within the fifty States as shown in the map above, CEMML researchers classified each installation into one of four resiliency categories (High, High-Moderate, Moderate-Low, Low). The researchers defined resiliency, in this study, as the inherent capability of the land to support intensive military training and testing, while sustaining the existing ecological system (physical-biological complex).The resiliency classification was based upon the potential for landscape disturbance, response and recovery from tracked vehicle maneuvers. The Table and Map below depict the results of this analysis.

NOTE 1: These 3 Installations (Forts Rucker, Stewart and Polk) were placed in a lower Resiliency Category than other installations in the same Division because they have an average rainfall-runoff erosivity characteristic that is significantly higher, increasing the potential for soil loss and resulting in lower rates of recovery.

NOTE 2: Pohakuloa Training Area experiences a rain-shadow effect caused by adjacent mountain ranges which alters the vegetation characteristics of the installation from rainforest to tropical steppe. This characteristic, within the Hawaiian Islands, is not accounted for in Bailey’s classification system

A follow-on study by CEMML researchers used this same framework to measure the relative resilience of 11 major Army range impact areas (designated areas for the firing of explosives and munitions) to explosive residue contamination. The method compared the ecological setting of each impact area against a common set of environmental fate and transport processes at the macro level, to include dissolution, absorption, and biological action. Using selected metrics for each process along with data available from various published sources, a relative ranking was achieved.

In a related study, CEMML researchers used Bailey’s framework for a strategic assessment of battle settings and operational analogs world-wide. Since Bailey’s classification has been expanded across the globe to the Domain and Division levels, it affords a logical and objective way in which to compare the geography of training lands in the United States with potential areas of conflict. By comparing recent conflict areas by ecoregion with similar Army land analogs in the United States, as shown in the Table below, an assessment of adequacy of the current Army land inventory was made.

The current Army land inventory was found adequate to prepare for conflict in temperate and dry areas, particularly those which support a desert- or continental-type climate, but inadequate for areas represented by the savanna, rain forest and Mediterranean ecoregions, as shown in the Figure below.

References:

Army Lands Applications:

1. Doe, W. W. III, Shaw, R.B., Bailey, R.G., Jones, D.S. and T. E. Macia (1999). "Locations and Environments of U.S. Army Training and Testing Lands: An Ecoregional Framework for Assessment", Federal Facilities Environmental Journal, Autumn 1999, pp. 9-26.
   
2. Houston, S.T., Doe, W. W. III and R.B.Shaw (2001). " Environmental Risk of Army Ranges and Impact Areas: An Ecoregional Framework for Assessment", Federal Facilities Environmental Journal, Spring 2001, pp. 93-111.
   
3. Shaw, R.B., Doe, W. W. III, Palka, E.J. and T.E. Macia (2000). "Sustaining Army Lands for Readiness in the 21st Century," Military Review, Fort Leavenworth, KS, pp. 68-77.

Note: References (1) and (3) can also be found in their complete text in the textbook, The Scope of Military Geography: Across the Spectrum from Peacetime to War (2000). Chapters15 &16, eds. E.J. Palka and F.A. Galgano, McGraw-Hill Primus Publishing, New York, pp. 359-392.

Military Lands Applications:

1. Leslie, M., Meffe, G. K., Hardesty, J. L., and Adams, D.L. (1996). Conserving Biodiversity on Military Lands: A Handbook for Natural Resources Managers, the Nature Conservancy, Arlington, VA, pp. 8-13. On the Web at:

https://www.denix.osd.mil/denix/Public/ES-Programs/Conservation/Biodiversity/biodiversity.html

2. Rubenson, D., Millot, M.D., Farnsworth, G. and J. Aroesty (1996). More than 25 Million Acres? DoD as a Federal, Natural, and Cultural Resource Manager, RAND Report MR-715-OSD, Santa Monica, CA, 114 pp.

 General Applications of Bailey’s Ecoregions:

1. Bailey, R.G. (1995). Description of the Ecoregions of the United States, 2d ed., USDA-Forest Service Miscellaneous Publication 1391, Washington, D.C., 108 pp. With separate map at 1:7,500,000.
   
2. Bailey, R.G. (1996). Ecosystem Geography, Springer-Verlag, Inc., New York, 204 pp.
   
3. Bailey, R.G. (1998). Ecoregions: The Ecosystem Geography of the Oceans and Continents, Springer-Verlag, Inc., New York, 176 pp.
   
4. Bailey, R.G. (2001). Regional Landscape Ecology and Sustainable Design, Springer-Verlag, Inc., New York, 200 pp., in press.
   
5. McNab, W. H. and P.E. Avers (1994). Ecological Subregions of the United States: Section Descriptons, USDA-Forest Service Report WO-WSA-5, Washington, D.C., July 1994.

Note: For additional information on the Web, see: http://www.fs.fed.us/institute/ecolink.html

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