Hard on the heels of a severe wildfire season, the first American conference on fire ecology and wildfire management is under way in San Diego. The conference was organized by the Land Use and Natural Resources Program of the University Extension office at UC Davis. Fire Conference 2000 arose from a series of regional fire ecology conferences developed by UC Davis University Extension. It brings together 1,000 top fire researchers, resource managers and other professionals from across the country. The co-chairs for this first national-level conference are Neil Sugihara of the U.S. Forest Service and Timothy Sexton of the National Parks Service. The conference coordinator is Sandy Cooper of UC Davis University Extension. The conference will examine hundreds of technical and policy solutions and research topics in fire prevention, management and response; fire and ecosystem management; fire and air and water quality; social and economic aspects of fire; the role of fire in habitat restoration and species management; and various historical case studies. The conference began Monday, Nov. 27, and concludes on Friday, Dec. 1, at the Town and Country Resort and Convention Center in San Diego. Conference hosts include the California Association for Fire Ecology (CAFE); the Joint Fire Science Program of the U.S. departments of agriculture and the interior; the International Association of Wildland Fire; Tall Timbers Research Station; and The Nature Conservancy. Over 20 other agencies and organizations are sponsoring the conference. According to the National Interagency Fire Center, more than 90,000 wildfires burned 7 million acres in the United States this year. (The average number of acres burned in each of the previous 10 years was about 3.8 million.) More than 860 structures burned. Fighting the fires employed more than 30,000 people and cost an estimated $1.6 billion. Congress has just approved a $1.8 billion plan to help with recovery and preparations for the future. UC Davis researchers from several campus departments will be making presentations on these topics: -- Fire, water quality and aquatic ecosystems; -- using geographic information systems (GIS) technology and computer modeling in fire management; -- nesting goshawks in burned areas in Yosemite National Park; -- impact of managed burning on prairie insect species richness; -- conifer invasion of aspen stands 80 years after a catastrophic fire; -- watershed effects of prescribed fire in the Lake Tahoe Basin; -- fire disturbance in a neotropical forest in Nicaragua. For complete conference details, visit http://universityextension.ucdavis.edu/fire/.