Metals406
Granfodder Runningsaw
And here it is in a nutshell. . .
Environmentalists cost money
- Thread starter forestryworks
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Please don't overlook this piece of the puzzle:
Low-intensity fires would have suppressed seedlings and kept an open understory, and would have encouraged a healthy spacing between larger, more fire-resistant mature trees. Logging in this case is a minor offender -- fire exclusion is the big one. No fire in a fire-dependent ecology nearly always results in occasional catastrophic fires, as opposed to frequent, non-catastrophic ones. Tree ring analysis of older trees should give an idea of historic fire return intervals in a given site; management strategies should be tailored to mimic this interval, bot for the health of the forests and for the protection of improvements.
Now, what about this "globul warmingz" I keep hearing about? Odds are that it will change the fire return interval for a given site. Whether it lengthens or shortens it will depend on the site. What is certain is that if one changes, the other will as well. Is climate change inevitable? The geologic record strongly suggests that it is. It's foolish to try to reset the clock to 1850 and pretend that the Industrial Revolution never happened.
Low-intensity fires would have suppressed seedlings and kept an open understory, and would have encouraged a healthy spacing between larger, more fire-resistant mature trees. Logging in this case is a minor offender -- fire exclusion is the big one. No fire in a fire-dependent ecology nearly always results in occasional catastrophic fires, as opposed to frequent, non-catastrophic ones. Tree ring analysis of older trees should give an idea of historic fire return intervals in a given site; management strategies should be tailored to mimic this interval, bot for the health of the forests and for the protection of improvements.
Now, what about this "globul warmingz" I keep hearing about? Odds are that it will change the fire return interval for a given site. Whether it lengthens or shortens it will depend on the site. What is certain is that if one changes, the other will as well. Is climate change inevitable? The geologic record strongly suggests that it is. It's foolish to try to reset the clock to 1850 and pretend that the Industrial Revolution never happened.
The A/S has been fairly proactive with their fuels reduction and thinning projects. However, some of the communities have been against cutting any trees. One place in particular did not want any work done around their area, until the Rodeo Chediski fire inspired them.
forestryworks
Addicted to ArboristSite
If those pre-1860 processes (low-intensity fires, etc.) worked before, why couldn't they work now? After all, man stopped those processes (fire suppression), not Mother Nature, so man can sure restore them.
Ponderosa likes open stands and frequent low-intensity burns. Ain't no other way around it.
Thin and burn, boys
Ponderosa likes open stands and frequent low-intensity burns. Ain't no other way around it.
Thin and burn, boys
If those pre-1860 processes (low-intensity fires, etc.) worked before, why couldn't they work now? After all, man stopped those processes (fire suppression), not Mother Nature, so man can sure restore them.
Ponderosa likes open stands and frequent low-intensity burns. Ain't no other way around it.
Thin and burn, boys
There are girls working there too!!
forestryworks
Addicted to ArboristSite
If those pre-1860 processes (low-intensity fires, etc.) worked before, why couldn't they work now? After all, man stopped those processes (fire suppression), not Mother Nature, so man can sure restore them.
Ponderosa likes open stands and frequent low-intensity burns. Ain't no other way around it.
Thin and burn, boys
That's a whole different discussion but has been my angle all along. Unfortunately, most people have been programmed to hate fire.
The loggers around here complain about merchantable timber burning up, and the hippies complain about the woodland creatures burning up.
What the loggers don't realize is that some of the finest and most profitable stands of timber were shaped by fire.
forestryworks
Addicted to ArboristSite
Do we partly blame Smokey Bear and partly blame our primeval fear?
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I think it was the culture of viewing forests as a cash crop, which I'm not against, but fire was an easy scapegoat to blame a lot of early problems on.
People from my grandparents' generation were totally against fire for the most part. People from my parents' generation were starting to come around
when I was a little kid (mid 70's.) The culture is starting to change but I see another 30-50 years going by before fire is an accepted land management
tool to the masses.
Another hurdle to overcome is the NIMBY response to smoke management. Lots of folks can be convinced that fire is useful in theory, so long as they don't have to know anything about it. We get a hundred calls every time we burn grass. It's so silly.
Dalmatian90
Addicted to ArboristSite
A lot of things in life are over-reactions to legitimate problems.
(Oh, about half the "rules" of the Catholic Church, for example.)
Between railroads, casual attitudes, and (though I suspect it was more hyperbole then fact) blaming fires on immigrants out fishing...Connecticut around 1900 in a typical year would burn roughly 100,000 acres.
That was 3% of our land area each year, and since it wasn't evenly distributed it meant many areas saw destructive brush fires every 10-15 years that wiped out young trees before a forest could ever take hold.
We worked that down; the last of the really big wildfires were in the early 1960s. Today if we burn more then 500 acres in fires over an acre in size, it's a bad year.
100,000 acres was way, way excessive and caused by human indifference. That was the story in many areas that had been logged over; I suspect it probably also held true out west.
And like a lot of things, we over-reacted and went from too casual an attitude on fire to one where we keep it too bottled up.
(Oh, about half the "rules" of the Catholic Church, for example.)
Between railroads, casual attitudes, and (though I suspect it was more hyperbole then fact) blaming fires on immigrants out fishing...Connecticut around 1900 in a typical year would burn roughly 100,000 acres.
That was 3% of our land area each year, and since it wasn't evenly distributed it meant many areas saw destructive brush fires every 10-15 years that wiped out young trees before a forest could ever take hold.
We worked that down; the last of the really big wildfires were in the early 1960s. Today if we burn more then 500 acres in fires over an acre in size, it's a bad year.
100,000 acres was way, way excessive and caused by human indifference. That was the story in many areas that had been logged over; I suspect it probably also held true out west.
And like a lot of things, we over-reacted and went from too casual an attitude on fire to one where we keep it too bottled up.
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