Emily Heyerdahl

Emeritus Research Forester

Research Topics

  • Multicentury fire history from tree rings in western North America
  • Climate and topographic drivers of historical fire regimes across landscapes
  • Climate drivers of historical regional-fire years

Personal Summary

Emily Heyerdahl is a Research Forester at the Missoula Fire Sciences Lab.  She is on the affiliate faculty of the University of Idaho and Montana State University. She co-chairs the Board of Directors of the International Multiproxy Paleofire Database.

Emily’s research focuses on inferring the drivers of spatial and temporal variation in fire regimes over the past several centuries using tree rings and modern fire records. These drivers include climate, forest type, topography, and land use. She has developed fire and forest histories across a range of forest and fire regime types in Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, Utah, California, British Columbia, and the Sierra Madre Occidental of Mexico.

Aside from tree rings, Emily's passions are her family, hiking, backpacking, and sea kayaking.