Good fire, bad fire
And the first story I ever wrote about forest management
Volume 2, Number 22 - Monday, Oct. 23, 2023
Published twice a week, on Monday and Thursday
Perspective
THIS IS THE SEASON for prescribed burning. As I’ve been reporting for weeks, land managers in the Sierra Nevada have been planning these burns for months and even years. If conditions are right, they will execute those plans.
The result, we hope, will be more resilient, healthier forests.
I was poking around the Internet this morning and came across an interesting article written by a student in Belmont, a Bay Area community. High school junior Kara Kim did a good job of presenting information about the purpose of prescribed fire and also drew attention to a UCLA study that suggests that it will become even more challenging to use this land management tool. You can read her report HERE. And an excerpt:
The study predicts that by 2060, the number of RxDays, or days favorable for prescribed fire, will significantly decrease by around 10 days per year across the West Coast. Projected decreases are most significant in the Pacific Southwest—reaching 16.6 fewer days yearly.
You can read more about the study Kim referenced HERE.
I FIRST LEARNED about prescribed fire as a student journalist. If you like, you can read the first story I ever wrote about forest management and prescribed fire HERE.
And here’s an excerpt:
“People don’t realize that not all fire is bad,” says Marvin Whalls, a Natural Resources Management instructor. The Smokey Bear program has led the public to believe that forest fires are bad and must be prevented. “Actually, fire is part of the environment. Except for the problem with erosion and property damage to man, forest would be almost entirely advantageous,” Whalls continued. “What we have to worry about, though, is wildfire.”
Wildfires are a different story. While fire as a management tool is being used with success more and more today, catastrophic wildfires, such as the ones in California recently, burn indiscriminately and uncontrollably.
Please note that I wrote those words 53 years ago!
Fire as a management tool can be risky business. Sometimes prescribed fires escape, with devastating results. Whether purposeful or accidental, fire releases smoke into the atmosphere. Over the past 50-some years, we’ve all learned more about how burning was used by native people in California and elsewhere — and we’ve seen the buildup of fuels and mega-fires.
Lately, I’m noticing more management activity that combines a natural wildfire caused by lightning into what resembles a prescribed fire for, as land managers say, the “resource benefits.” You can read more about that in reports about the Rabbit Fire HERE. “Full suppression with significant resource enhancement” is how the management activity is described on Inciweb.
I’ve been writing about good fire and bad fire off and on for more than 50 years. I’m hoping for the best outcome for the giant sequoias and all of us as this season’s burning continues.
Wildfire, water & weather update
The San Francisco Chronicle this morning reports that “roller coaster weather” is headed for California, with a dry break today and tomorrow before a cold front from the Pacific Northwest on Wednesday increases chances of rain across Northern California and light snow in the Sierra Nevada. You can read that article HERE (gift link). The best Sierra Nevada weather forecasts can be found at NWS Hanford, HERE, and NWS Sacramento, HERE.
Wildfire update: As weather and other conditions allow, prescribed burning continues at many locations in the Sierra Nevada. If you check out the WatchDuty map HERE you’ll see a string of green flame icons where prescribed burning is taking place. Most other fires are in a wind-down phase.
The future of this newsletter
I appreciate the response I’ve had from a number of readers about the future of this newsletter and my Giant Sequoia News efforts since writing about this on Thursday. If you missed that, you can read it HERE. If there is sufficient support, I would like to reshape this effort into a nonprofit news organization.
As I noted, there was a time when newspapers up and down the state had reporters who did a fine job of covering giant sequoia and related Sierra Nevada issues. Those days are gone forever.
With more support, I think Giant Sequoia News could grow to fill the resultant void.
If you have ideas, please reach out.
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Giant sequoias in the news
• Guy McCarthy of The Union -Democrat in Sonora has a report HERE about the upcoming burning planned at Calaveras Big Trees State Park.
• The Fresno Bee on Friday published an opinion piece by Jeremy Clar and Chad Hanson with the headline: “U.S. Park Service ignores evidence in misguided sequoia planting project.” The referenced project is the plan by Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks to reestablish seedlings in giant sequoia groves. I’ve reported on this project several times, and you can read more HERE. Clar is the chair of the Tehipite Chapter of the Sierra Club, based in Fresno. Hanson is a research ecologist with Earth Island Institute’s John Muir Project, and the author of the book Smokescreen. Readers may also know that Earth Island Institute has initiated a number of lawsuits related to Sierra Nevada land management, including one against the Forest Service, reported HERE, having to do with the giant sequoia emergency response in the Nelder Grove.
• Carl Nolte for the San Francisco Chronicle columnist Carl Nolte wrote about a recent visit to Yosemite HERE, describing his entry to the national park via Highway 120. Here’s an excerpt:
Then up and up, through forested country, past the scars of forest fires. It’s like an overture to some musical event. The trees seem to get bigger, the highway more winding. There is a turnout called “The Rim of the World,” a vista point with the real mountains in the far distance, like a preview. Maybe an hour of mountain roads later, at the end of a dark tunnel, as if it were the opening of a film, all of a sudden you get a first look at what John Muir called “the incomparable valley.’’ Yosemite.
• Mymotherlode.com reports HERE that overnight parking in Yosemite has ended due to anticipated snow at higher elevations.
Historic photo of the week
Thanks for reading!
Carl Nolte’s full article surprised me with the difficulties they had. It has been literally decades, since we visited the sequoias that we had none of the problems with accommodations and restaurants that he encountered. It makes me wonder what has happened to those amenities? It makes me hesitate about revisiting, if sleeping and eating are so expensive and so limited.