Montana Forest Owners Comment on Fire Hazards
The Montana Forest Landowners Network [here] posted the following comments they received from a survey they undertook in 2006. The comments speak for themselves, and quite eloquently:
Comments received from Aug. ‘06 Action Alert Survey to Family Forest Landowners:
* The State Wildlife management property adjacent to me is a fire hazard that threatens me and all my neighbors.
* The State land School Trust Sec 6 was selectively logged 3 years back. This was a great improvement removing beetle killed lodge pole and improving the remaining stand of larch and doug fir. The forest service land was logged four years back but not up to the boundary 300 to 500 yards buffer remains with very high fire hazard as a result of dead and mature lodge pole. The federal land’s forest is very thick with brush and trees.
* After more than two decades of forest and fuel management on several hundred acres of private property bordering national forest, in 2003 a wildfire, which started on public land (which had undergone NO forest/fuel management) raged into our wildland/urban interface and died out on managed private lands, but only after destroying two homes. If public land is handled in a negligent fashion, to disproportionately tax private landowners to defend themselves against their own government’s mismanagement is just plain wrong!
* The reason that State property fire risk is so high is because they cut trees and left them and because the county sprays weeds in such concentrations that highly flammable cheat grass grows on the slopes or other grasses in the borrow pits that are flammable when dry late in the summer. This is mainly a problem for south-facing slopes, which I have. I don’t have livestock so the grasses and ferns get pretty high. My neighbor to the west has a lot of cleared land that dries up in the summer. The USFS has no access, so they haven’t logged anything. They have lots of bug-killed trees in spots, but the trees are mixed species. We haven’t had a fire since 1910, but that was a big one—hit nearly all of my 65 acres. I am mainly worried about cigarette butt flippers, or vehicle accident fires. We hardly ever have lightning caused fires, except high in the mountains.
* One of the best forestry programs is the old 1960 to 1990 ASCS prune and thin payment program. A landowner could receive a per acre payment to thin the understory and then prune to best leave trees to a height of 18 feet. Yes, thinning put a lot of slash on the forest floor but in a few years it was flat on the ground and not much of a fire hazard. The pruned trees with no branches lower than 18 feet was a reduced fuel ladder. When combined with a logging thin first the fire danger was reduced by a big factor. The problem is cost. First federal funding has been cut or reduced. Second it is a lot of hard work for the landowner. Ten acres is a two to six month project. However, a lot of forest health and production is improved and in two, three years the fire danger is reduced. These are my thoughts on the subject. P.S. My wife & I were MT Tree Farmers of the Year in 1992. John Bowdish.
* Government owned land is the biggest hazard to private property, public health and safety. There should be an analysis of all fires that had private property loss or cost over $1 million in suppression cost to see where the fire started (Fed. State, private), what the fire hazard rating was in the start area, whether it started in a roadless or wilderness area. Government should be responsible for all losses resulting from fires that start and escape control on government land that has fire at a high fire hazard rating.
* When the state logged approx. five years ago they did not do a clean up/slash burn. Instead they just let it lay. In theory sometime in the future this will all decay. Nice letter to the editor Deb.
* My wife and I have been actively working on “fuel suppression” on our acreage since before it was called that. Only one private landowner adjacent to our property has not logged or thinned their tree stand but are active in a clean up program of their own. 60% of our fence line has been commercially logged by private owners. The state land adjacent to us has had 0! Nada! Zip! None! No! fuel management! It is thick with blow down and dead brush ladder fuels abound and is the worst kind of fire trap just begging for a lightning bolt to touch it off. Whomsoever is pointing their crooked finger at this landowner and calling me a problem as a potential fire problem is packing a mighty big pair. Up theirs!
* Any forestland tract in W. Saunders Co that is flat or gently sloping is being rapidly divided into parcels for homesites or similar use. Woodland tracts large enough to be managed as forest land are becoming fewer very rapidly. We need much more management activity (including moderate type timber harvests) and stand density reduction.
* We have BPA power lines to the west which provides a canopy break from prevailing winds but grass land on our land would carry fire quickly to our home. Steps have been taken to reduce wildland fire risk through active fuels management but more is required. Roads around and near us also provide fuel breaks. Our neighbor also manages his land for fuels reduction with a good management plan. Even after management new doug fir regen begins to pose a risk after 15-25 years treatment. Doug fir mistletoe is also a factor in building dense poor health stands in our area. Some help would come from county legislation restrictions on fireworks limiting a window of use on or near traditional times. I believe in what you are doing and believe in insect and disease cuts to promote forest health and public awareness.
* I applied for federal funds under the hazard reduction plan but the paperwork got lost and on two attempts to contact program coordinator were unsuccessful. These were personally going to her office. I had also made several phone calls therefore I am questioning the benefits of “cost share” programs. Kay Pegg
* My property line adjoining USFS is largely inaccessible. It is 70% slope and is above 100’ cliff band. Helicopter logging is possible not much else. In this area I have done little management either, so compared to USFS is equal. Thus the 3 rating. The actual fire hazard is probably a 5 on both ownerships. I have done a lot of fuel reduction on my land where it is accessible, including dead fuel cleanup, live tree thinnings, pruning to 20’ ht, and 100% slash removal by piling and burning.
* After the big snow fall of ’96 the forest service did about nothing to harvest or manage the downed trees resulting in large surface fuels and fir beetle. We have two sections of forest service within a 2 -3 mile radius that needs a good clean up.
* I am a retired research silviculturist. My land borders Dr. Steve Arno, in part. My wife Sally and I have put in hundreds of hours “sweat equity” in reducing risk of catastrophic fire on our land. Our land would be an asset to the state if wildfire occurred in the area. Heavy fuels are nearly eliminated and we have good access. Thanks—Clint Carlson
* Often times a small timber sale can be implemented at the time of hazardous fuels removal. This would help small landowners pay part of their share of the cost share. Unfortunately, under current rules, any sales income reduces the amount of the non-owner cost share. This should be changed.
* Before DNRC gives private landowners cost share assistance and regulations on how to thin and practice on their land with their cost share assistance, they need to look at their own forests; i.e. Stillwater, for thinning and how to maintain it.
* Federal lands (Nat. Forest) are on 50% of my borders. That forest is so dense that moose or elk with full antlers can’t walk through it. Really, no brush or forbes or grass grow on it. I believe it is not IF it burns but WHEN!
* The USFS has used prescribe fire along 1,500’ of our property boundary. We live in steep mountainous terrain designed semiprimitive roadless recreation. Wildfire always has and always will be a part of this landscape. We have a 500 gallon water tank and pump and hose for an initial attack, as well as barricade fire gel, but of course our fire suppression capabilities are limited. I believe the USFS would do more prescribed burning in our area if funds were available. Everything considered, the USFS is doing a good job with the resources they have available. Few of the private landowners manage their lands effectively for fire suppression in my area.
* The state lands west of our property have had no active management that has been recorded. We have been working with DNRC Kalispell and Missoula for the last ten or so years to try to get them to clean up their disease problems and density problems but so far plans and talk but no action.
* I applied for FLEP was approved and then the program was defunded. I applied for EQUIP and was approved for only 20 or so acres for precommercial thin even though their forester said our forest was a fire waiting to happen. Would have done more but cannot seem to get any assistance even though we have a MT Stewardship plan and are a Tree Farm. Very frustrated with DNRC and NRCS, they hve both been a waste of time and money for no return. We are 1,000 acres surrounded by subdivision, if we burn, so do they.
* Until the fires of 2003, the public land (Lolo NF) adjacent to our neighborhood’s land of over 200 acres was extremely heavily fuel loaded. Because of this heavy fuel loading, when lightning struck public land over 5 miles away from our neighborhood, there was absolutely nothing that could have stopped the 300 high foot flames that came off of public lands into our neighborhood—destroying homes and timber. The only thing that kept this catastrophic fire from burning into the more dense urban city was the buffer provided by family forestland that had been properly managed for fuel reduction (and also the 60 mph winds subsiding). The family owned forestlands affected by this tragedy of unmanaged public lands have been owned and managed for well over 50 years.
* Surveys of NIPFers are a good function of the MFOA! Thanks for asking. We are currently checking into a grant (EQIP) to do the rest of our property. NRCS has come out and done their preliminary surveys. We’ll know by Oct. (we hope) if we’ve been accepted. D. Brent Mitchell
* We have actively worked at managing our forest land on the Mannix Ranches each year since 1980. Our practices have been forest stand improvement (thinning & harvesting) which involves slash treatment—none of our homes are in the forest.
