The SageSuccess Project is a joint effort between the USGS, BLM, and USFWS to examine the factors that contribute to the establishment of big sagebrush. This first webinar will address the project overview, sagebrush restoration, and implications for resistance to invasive species and resilience to site disturbance. These will be presented in three 10-minute presentations by:

David Pilliod: The History, Study Design, and Partnerships of the SageSuccess Project - The SageSuccess project required considerable planning and partnership building and coordination. Early partner engagement and flexibility were key to our success. This presentation sets the stage for why and how the project formed, what lessons we learned along the way, and where the science may take us next.

Matt Germino: Big Picture Considerations for Sagebrush Restoration - Sagebrush ecosystems are often perceived a homogenous "seas" of shrubs, but efforts to restore these them consistently reveal to us the striking variation within and among sites. The heterogeneity occurs in time with due to factors such as weather variation, and in space due to climatic, topographic, and edaphic effects. Superimposed on this variability is a remarkable genetic diversity within sagebrush and its associated species. An overview of the challenges and opportunities associated with this environmental and organismal variability for sagebrush restoration will be presented

Robert Arkle: Is Resistance & Resilience a Useful Predictive Tool? - The concept of ecological resistance and resilience to disturbance and subsequent invasion is becoming a cornerstone of conservation management in many ecosystems, including the Great Basin. However, whether this theory works in practice is largely untested at broad spatial and temporal scales. We assess whether resistance and resilience theory is supported by field data from over 200 post-wildfire rehabilitation sites sampled from 1–35 years post-treatment throughout the Great Basin.