Shall the USFS Allow Fires to Incinerate Our National Forests?
Part V
10. Let It Burn Has Significant National Economic Impact
The effects of the changes over the last five years to federal wildfire policies have resulted in our land management agencies allowing unspecified lightning-ignited fires to burn in megafires. The changes include AMR (appropriate management response), WFU (wildland fires used for “resource benefit”), and ACMS (accountable cost management strategy). Those programs were set in place not by Congress but by the Wildland Fire Leadership Council, the federal advisory board that oversees the National Fire Plan.
The Wildland Fire Leadership Council has been taken over by radical non-governmental organizations, wealthy (though allegedly non-profit) multi-national corporations with anti-American agendas. Our national fire policies are set by foreigners and a political elite that is more interested in fomenting economic collapse in this country than with our environmental health and economic well-being.
This week Congress adjourns to go on recess without dealing with the collapse of the USFS budget due to wildfire costs. Not only did Congress fail to address rising energy costs, they abandoned the FLAME Act in a desperate hour of need. The 2008 fire funding is used up, the budget spent, and the USFS is forced to transfer hundreds of millions of dollars from other programs to the fire budget.
Where did the money go? Some for instances:
The Basin/Indians Fire has cost over $120 million while burning unnecessarily 244,000 acres [here]. It has become MOST EXPENSIVE fire in California history, and the 2nd most expensive in U.S. history (the Biscuit Fire in Oregon in 2002 cost $150,000,000). Most of the dollars and acres burned up were due to backfires set by firefighters. Fire managers announced proudly at the onset that they were applying the “accountable cost management strategy” and proceeded to break the bank. When the Basin Fire reached homes dozens of miles from the ignition point, the firefighters fled and homeowners fought the fire themselves. Yet the homeowners are being blamed for the fire “suppression” costs. At no time during the last 30 years did the USFS initiate any fuels management or fire road construction in the area, because Congress designated the area a wilderness, even though human beings have been living there for 10,000 years.
The Clover Fire [here] began with a lightning strike May 31 that fizzled in a few acres. It could have been extinguished for a few thousand dollars. But because it was in a designated wilderness the Inyo NF declared the Clover Fire a WFU (wildland fire used for alleged resource benefit). The Clover Fire was “monitored” until it blew up into a 15,000 acre wildfire that burned all the way to Hwy 395 and threatened homes in Kennedy Meadows. It eventually cost over $8 million to suppress. Homeowners dozens of miles from the ignition point are being blamed.
The Unokom Fire [here] began June 21 from lightning on the Six Rivers NF. It is still burning, having consumed 40,000 unkempt and untended acres and nearly $20 million to date.
The Siskiyou Fire [here] also began June 21 from lightning on the Klamath NF. It is still burning, having consumed 60,000 unkempt and untended acres and nearly $25 million to date. Fire managers promulgated a plan early on to allow the Siskiyou Fire to burn 40,000 acres. Then they backtracked and reset the goal at 80,000 acres. Recreation along the Klamath River has been shut down all summer.
The Lime Fires [here] began June 21 on the Shasta-Trinity NF. Together with the Yolla Bolly Fires [here] (which have been split off for “statistical” purposes) over 154,000 acres have been burned at a cost of over $52 million. It is the largest fire in the history of Northern California. A Strategic Implementation Plan for the Yolla Bolly Fire was presented yesterday after a month of burning.
One portion of this fire complex was under the purview of CalFire. They contained their area three weeks ago. In contrast three weeks ago the Feds called in the National Guard. The Guardsmen have departed now, with pomp and ceremony. Both the Lime and Yolla Bolly Fires continue to burn uncontained. The town of Hayfork has been threatened all summer. No doubt, the town’s residents will be blamed for everything.
Shall the USFS Allow Fires to Incinerate Our National Forests?
Part IV
Continuing our rebuttal of the recent 3-part series the Idaho Statesman that promoted the idea of allowing forest fires to burn unchecked.
Let It Burn is illegal, destructive of a multitude of forest and human values, is not cost-effective, and is the worst idea that ever came down the forest pike. Let me count the ways.
8. Let It Burn Has Significant Effects on Recreation
Forest fires have significant deleterious effects on flora, fauna, heritage, soils, water quality, and air quality. Those cumulative impacts ruin recreational opportunities, too.
Recreations (hiking, camping, boating, hunting, fishing, etc.) are important and valued uses of the public domain. While always of traditional importance, recreational uses have moved to the forefront as the “replacement” for renewable resource uses such as timber production.
Let It Burn fires have enormous impacts on recreation. Prime recreation areas were on fire during the summers of 2006 and 2007 and are again this year. Whole national forests have been closed to use.
The Los Padres NF has been under a closure due to fires for over a year, first because of the Zaca Fire and then due to Basin/Indians Fires. Nearly 500,000 acres have been scorched, and the trail networks, campgrounds, wildlife, and vegetation have been destroyed.
The Los Padres NF issued the following press release last October:
USDA Forest Service - Los Padres National Forest, 10/04/07
“The Zaca Fire burned in very steep and rugged terrain, and while there are islands of unburned vegetation, there are vast areas that are a moonscape now,” Forest Supervisor Peggy Hernandez explained. “With the vegetation gone, there is nothing to hold the soil in place, so the land is very unstable. Dry landslides, rockslides and other erosion is occurring on a daily basis. We expect mudslides and flash flooding when the rains come. Out of concern for public safety, and to allow the watersheds to begin to heal, I will keep the burned area closed to public entry at least through spring 2008,” she added.
“The burned or otherwise disturbed soils are very vulnerable, especially to wheeled vehicles, until vegetation gets reestablished,” said Hernandez. “We know people are anxious to get back into their national forest, but we are asking for their patience and cooperation.”
Preliminary surveys of the burned area show that many hiking trails have been severely damaged by the fire and are completely impassable. “Our volunteers are very anxious to get in there and help reestablish the trails. Unfortunately, it may be some time before the ground is stable enough to allow them to be rebuilt,” said Santa Barbara District Ranger Cindy Chojnacky.
The Zaca Fire started on July 4, and burned approximately 240,207 acres before it was contained on September 2. It is the second largest fire in California’s recorded history and the largest in Santa Barbara County’s recorded history.
Flash floods did arrive last Winter. Only this month has the area been partially opened to recreation, but the trail system has been all but erased.
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Shall the USFS Allow Fires to Incinerate Our National Forests?
Part III
We continue our rebuttal of the recent 3-part series the Idaho Statesman that promoted the idea of allowing forest fires to burn unchecked.
Let It Burn is illegal, destructive of a multitude of forest and human values, is not cost-effective, and is the worst idea that ever came down the forest pike. Let me count the ways.
6. Let It Burn Has Significant Effects on Water and Watersheds
Forest fires have significant deleterious effects on water quality, stream flow, forest hydrology, and riparian and aquatic conditions. Allowing forest fires to burn unchecked leads to additional acreage burned, and additional impacts to water-related resources.
Water may be the most valuable resource produced by our national forests. Water yield and water quality from public lands are depended upon by agriculture and every major town and city in West. Degradation and pollution of streams and rivers is the most damaging aspect of catastrophic forest fires in dollar terms (even more than the destruction of flora, fauna, and heritage values).
Severe fires impact soils and cause erosion and mass wastage when rains return. Flash floods have occurred within the Zaca Burn (2007) and (already) the Piute Burn (2008) that have impacted communities far outside the burn areas. Landslides and mudflows have peppered central Idaho following the 800,000 acre burn of 2007 (multiple but contiguous fires), and this summer rivers are running chocolate with silt following every thundershower.
Among the effects of fire on soil and water are (this is a short list):
- Changes in infiltration due to collapse of soil structure, increase in bulk density, removal of organic matter, reduction in soil porosity, clogged soil pores, and increased reaction to rainfall droplet kinetics
- Decrease in soil wettability (hydrophobia), concretion, increased water repellence, increases in surface flow, increase soil particle transport, rilling, gulleying, and increased erosion
- Substantial changes in stream water chemistry, solid and dissolved material transport, pH, bacteriological characteristics, sediment influx and transport, dissolved sulfates, nitrates, nitrites, chlorides, iron, and other cations, and turbidity,
- Increases and decreases in discharge rates and seasonal streamflows, peak flows including flash flooding, minimum flows, as well as total annual streamflows,
- Degradation of aquatic habitat, aquatic biota, spawning gravels, fish populations, cultural resources, and human health and safety.
Shall the USFS Allow Fires to Incinerate Our National Forests?
Part II
We continue our rebuttal of the recent 3-part series the Idaho Statesman that promoted the idea of allowing forest fires to burn unchecked.
Let It Burn is illegal, destructive of a multitude of forest and human values, is not cost-effective, and is the worst idea that ever came down the forest pike. Let me count the ways.
4. Let It Burn Has Significant Effects on Fauna, Including Threatened and Endangered Species
The effects of fire on wildlife are highly significant. Wildfire has impacted birds, mammals, reptiles, amphibians, fish, insects and mollusks in habitats across the West, perhaps for thousands of years. Modern forest fires in dense stands tend to kill all the trees and thus alter wildlife habitat for decades or longer.
There are hundreds of animal species with special conservation status (Threatened, Endangered, Candidate, or Special Species) that occur in, or have historic ranges in western forests. Historically western wildfires burned frequently in low- to moderate-intensity fires, most likely of anthropogenic origin. Modern lightning-ignited fires are generally higher in intensity and severity and can have adverse impacts on species with special status.
Animals dependent on deep forests and old-growth conditions are particularly at risk from severe wildfires. These include such notable species as spotted owls, marbled murrelets, fishers, wolverines, salamanders, and frogs. Numerous other species of less notoriety are also impacted by catastrophic fires including entire guilds and communities of bird species, hundreds of arthropod species, turtles and tortoises, squirrels and other arborial mammals, and untold numbers of mollusks (woodland snail species are still being discovered).
A few animal species thrive after catastrophic fires, such as ants, termites, bees, and some species of woodpeckers. These are mainly detritivores that feed on rotting wood, or predators of detritivores. However, those species are abundant in unburned forests as well, are not rare, and are few in number compared to the species eliminated by catastrophic forest fires.
Modern forest fires in dense forests can convert entire ecosystems because the former forests are converted to pyrophytic brush. Whereas a forest ecosystem extends 150 feet or more vertically, the replacement ecosystems are short. Total ecosystem volume can be reduced by 90 percent or more following modern forest fires. So too biodiversity and biological production are reduced by that amount or more.
Conversion of forests to pyrophytic (fire-type) brush can be more or less permanent. Following catastrophic forest fires there is often more dead wood than before the fire because the living green trees are killed. Sprouting brush provides fine fuels and soon the fire hazard has returned, only more so. Recurring fires at 20 to 80 year frequencies eliminate tree species entirely. Thus ecosystems are permanently converted to brush. Entire animal communities are eliminated as well.
Brush dwelling species are common, and growing more common year by year as more heritage forests are eliminated. Forest dwelling animal species are the rarest in the West today, the most at risk, and the most likely to be extirpated by catastrophic forest fires.
The Endangered Species Act requires the federal government to protect listed species, and requires federal agencies to consult with the US Fish and Wildlife Service prior to undertaking actions which might significantly impact listed species. The US Forest Service has adopted Let It Burn policies with NO consultations as required by ESA. This is yet another example of the slippery slope into criminality that Let It Burn imparts to the USFS.
Shall the USFS Allow Fires to Incinerate Our National Forests?
Part I
In a recent 3-part series the Idaho Statesman asked the rhetorical question, “Are we wasting billions fighting wildfires?” Authors Heath Druzin and Rocky Barker answered their question with, “We can protect cabins, make the forests healthier and save money by allowing more fires to burn,” and parodying Smokey Bear’s famous dictum, “‘Only you’ can change how we deal with fire.”
The 3-part serial is [here, here, and here].
The authors quote yours truly:
Michael Dubrasich, a Lebanon, Ore., consulting forester, is critical of forest policy, too. The federal government is wasting timber and backing away from its historic role of protecting private property.
“The fires that start on unkempt federal land and spread to private property are irresponsible spillovers perpetrated upon American citizens by their own government,” Dubrasich said.
So that was nice. But by and large the authors made a case for Let It Burn, despite my wise words. For that reason, and in defense of our forests and forest-based communities, I offer this rebuttal.
Let It Burn is illegal, destructive of a multitude of forest and human values, is not cost-effective, and is the worst idea that ever came down the forest pike. Let me count the ways.
1. Let It Burn Is Illegal
This is the crux of the matter at hand. The USFS has adopted a policy and is undertaking actions (and an unknown number of future actions) in the form of unfought forest fires that have significant effects upon forests and natural resources and on surrounding properties, communities, habitats, watersheds, and airsheds.
Those significant effects must be evaluated through the NEPA process of drafting an Environmental Impact Statement, together with all the public involvement the EIS process entails. The public must have a suitable opportunity to evaluate and comment upon federal actions that impact the environment under NEPA (the National Environmental Policy Act).
Federal forest policy Politics and politicians The 2008 Fire Season
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Torching the Budget
Today the Sacramento Bee published an interesting article entitled “Forest Service burns through its budgets” [here]. A quote:
WASHINGTON – The Forest Service has struggled for years to pay for fighting fires that last year alone scorched almost 10 million acres, mainly in the West. As fire seasons grow longer and the blazes more intense in forests stressed by global warming, the agency’s funding woes mount.
In fact, the Forest Service has already spent roughly $900 million this year, almost 75 percent of its fire-suppression budget, and the season is just nearing its peak.
Nearly half the Forest Service’s annual budget now is spent on battling wildfires or trying to prevent them. In 1991, 13 percent of its budget was spent on fires.
As the costs have grown, so has the toll on the agency’s other programs. To pay for its fire programs, the Forest Service has raided accounts used for everything from reforestation to fish and wildlife to building campgrounds and trails. In theory, those accounts are expected to be repaid. In practice, it’s not that easy.
“The whole damn thing is imploding,” said Casey Judd, business manager of the Federal Wildland Fire Service Association, in Inkom, Idaho. The group represents firefighters in five federal agencies.
Every year, Congress provides emergency money to bail out the Forest Service and other federal land management agencies. Over the past 10 years, it has provided $3.9 billion in emergency funding to fight fires. But some on Capitol Hill are getting tired of the Forest Service coming hat-in-hand every year because its budgets fail to adequately reflect firefighting costs.
“The Forest Service would be on its knees except for the money Congress provides,” said Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Wash., who as chairman of the House interior appropriations subcommittee oversees the agency’s budget. “This thing is pretty close to being out of control.”
Not close, Norm, it’s there. Furthermore the USFS fire budget has been out of control for at least 3 years now. So has the acreage burned, which has been rising steadily for at least five years.
Costs have risen right along with acreage. Already this year we have experienced a 245,000 acre fire (the Basin/Indians Complex [here]) that has burned up $115 million in fire supression dollars to date. It will soon be the most expensive fire in California history.
A Burning Desire
The following essay was written in 1999, but it is just as valid today because things haven’t changed. We repost from the Free Republic [here].
© 1999 by Mark Edward Vande Pol, all rights reserved.
If environmentalists were left to their own devices, do they have a better way to manage wild-lands? Criticisms by environmentalists about private enterprise are so ubiquitous it is high time to critically analyze of one of their proposals. How often are their plans submitted for scrutiny, peer review, or an EIS? The sad part is that it is so easy to do. The cited text is reprinted off the Sierra Club web site.
Sierra Club Policy: Public Lands Fire Management
Sierra Club Board of Directors March 17-19, 1989:
(Yep, this is the current policy, adopted immediately AFTER the Yellowstone Fire.)
1. Fire is a natural, integral, and valuable component of many ecosystems. Fire management must be a part of the management of public lands. Areas managed for their natural values often benefit from recurring wildfires and may be harmed by a policy of fire suppression. Long-term suppression of small wildfires may build up conditions making occasional catastrophic conflagrations inevitable.”
Recurring fire is a natural occurrence in the West, unless people have suppressed fire for sixty years. That process of suppression has been harmful. The fuel load is not at a ‘natural’ level. It will not result therefore in a ‘natural’ fire. ‘Inevitable’ implies, ‘It is too big a problem and too much potentially harmful work to do anything to mitigate’. It is inferred that nobody is responsible for a conflagration if it happens because it’s ‘natural’. If the fuel level was forced by human activity, does ignition absolve those who had a choice of the time of ignition and the composition of the fuel?
2. Every fire should be monitored. Naturally occurring fires should be allowed to burn in areas where periodic burns are considered beneficial and where they can be expected to burn out before becoming catastrophic. Human-caused fires in such areas should be allowed to burn or be controlled on a case-by-case basis.
Note the prejudice toward unplanned fires. They want monitoring but not planning. Are they crazy? They just said that catastrophic fire was ‘inevitable.’ Who is going to be responsible for determining whether it will go out by itself or progress to a catastrophe on a case-by-case basis? Weather in the mountain regions of California is highly changeable, localized, and unpredictable. Are they going to get everybody together for a meeting before they decide while the fire builds? Who controls the fire if the only plan for ignition is that there should be no plan?
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2007 Fire Season Federal forest policy The 2008 Fire Season
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Are Forests Healthy After Incineration?
“Most scientists and fire managers agree that fire is a healthy and necessary part of the forest,” Rocky Barker, a journalist, not a scientist or a forest manager, Idaho Statesman.
The Leftwing wants to burn Idaho forests to the ground. It’s GOOD for forests according to liberal journalists. Here’s what hopping anti-forest extremists did to Idaho forests last summer, cheered on by the liberal toadies at the Boise Idaho Statesman. Do these forests look HEALTHY to you? For more pics of what the wackos did to 800,000 acres (1,250 sq miles) of central Idaho in 2007, click here, here, and here.
PS — You will NEVER see photos like these in the Idaho Statesman.
Federal forest policy Politics and politicians The 2008 Fire Season
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The Payette Lets It Burn Again
After incinerating 470,529 acres of the Payette NF last summer [here], the Payette NF managers are at it again. The Rush Creek Fire is burning freely and blowing up to mega-proportions in the nation’s leading Let It Burn laboratory.
Sparked by unknown causes on July 15, the Rush Creek Fire is now 200 acres and expanding rapidly. There is no staffing on the Rush Creek Fire, no attempt to contain, control, or extinguish it. Burn, baby, burn is business as usual on the radical and lawless Payette.
This may seem like an innocuous fire, but last year the Payette NF decided to let innocuous fires burn until 800,000 acres were incinerated across three national forests [here, here, here, here, here].
This blurb was spit up last week on the Payette NF website [here]:
McCall, ID (July 18, 2008) – The Krassel Ranger District is currently managing the 30 [sic] acre Rush Creek Fire in the Frank Church – River of No Return Wilderness. The fire is located in the Rush Creek area near Shellrock Creek in a remote area characterized by steep slopes and rocky terrain and is not threatening property or people [just forests, wildlife, watershed, and other resource values].
The cause of the fire is unknown [we're clueless and don't really care]. It began on July 15 and is burning in heavy timber [i.e. forests, the kind with trees]. Currently, the fire is staying on the ground and moving slowly through the forest [until it blew up to 200 acres and is now rapidly growing]. The fire was at 20 acres when it was discovered and grew to an estimated 30-40 acres, due in part to an increase in wind [but she's a roaring now. Whoopsie daisy, another bonehead bad fire behavior prediction]. Thunderstorms are expected to bring wind and rain today and tomorrow but temperatures are predicted to bring hotter and drier conditions over the weekend.
The fire is being closely monitored via over flights by fire staff [no firefighter is going near it]. Fire Management Staff and Forest leadership are monitoring the fire’s progression and will implement point protection if values become threatened [that would be never on the Payette. They have no values]. Fire behavior modeling is also being utilized to help predict the progression and spread of the fire across the landscape [even though the models are funky and wrong].
The Rush Creek Fire is being managed and not immediately suppressed because of its location, the potential for resource benefits associated with fire and the lack of any threat to people or property [WHAT GODDAMN RESOURCE BENEFITS????????????????]. Not suppressing the fire also does not put firefighters at risk unnecessarily [just the forests, wildlife, watersheds, etc.] Firefighter and public safety are priorities as fire managers consider the array of fire management tools available to them [such as sit on their fat cans and do nothing].
This pro-holocauster government babble and horrific abrogation of legally mandated responsibilities is likely to lead to another megafire at the cost of tens of $millions and damages in the hundreds of $millions. They got away with it last year (no Payette person was prosecuted or jailed for burning 1,250 square miles of public forest).
There has been no Environmental Impact Statement written, no hearings, no Declarations by Forest Supervisor Susie Raines, not even the slightest nod towards U.S. environmental laws such as NEPA, ESA, NHPA, NFMA, or all the rest. The Payette don’t need no stinking laws to do Let It Burn.
Please call the Payette National Forest at (208) 634-0700, (208) 634-0784, or (208) 634-6945 to express your displeasure.
Federal forest policy Politics and politicians Saving Forests
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Surprising Ruling By the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals
by Claudia Elliott, Editor and Publisher of the Southern Sierra Messenger
As fires rage throughout California—and many believe their severity could be reduced by active forest management—there is a hope of a cool breeze coming from the Ninth US Circuit Court of Appeals.
No, this is not an April Fool’s joke in July. The Ninth Circuit is known for a range of what many people would call “wacky” decisions, particularly concerning environmental issues, which is why a ruling by an 11-judge panel of the court last week has some folks in shock.
Bottom line: The panel ruled that it’s improper for federal judges to act as scientists when weighing in on disputed U.S. Forest Service timber projects.
In their ruling, the judges overturned a July 2007 decision by a three-judge Ninth Circuit panel that halted the Mission Brush timber sale in the Idaho Panhandle National Forest. The litigating environmental groups in the case contended that the Forest Service’s logging plan would harm the region’s ecosystem for species including small, migratory owls. The ruling also overturned a 2005 decision concerning a Forest Service project in Western Montana.
U.S. Agriculture Department Undersecretary Mark Rey, who oversees the Forest Service, told the Associated Press that the ruling was “the most important decision involving a Forest Service environmental case in the last two decades,” saying it restores the ability of federal agencies, not meddling judges, to exercise discretion over timber sales.
“The judges established a much more limited framework for judicial review of Forest Service decisions – a framework that’s much more consistent with the standard use by other circuits,” Rey said last week. “The court says its role is not to act as a panel of scientists. They wanted to move back to a more appropriate role.”
It’s too early to know exactly what ramifications this ruling will have on Sequoia National Forest, Giant Sequoia National Monument, or other public lands throughout California. Environmental groups commenting so far have tried to minimize the importance of the ruling.
Personally, I value environmental review and I value community input in projects involving public lands. But too often, good projects developed with sound science and lots of effort are overturned by judges who have, as the Ninth Circuit panel determined, overstepped their bounds.
Perhaps this decision will level the playing field and return land use decisions to the public agencies who I will expect to follow the laws, rules, and regulations that apply–but hopefully without having a judge side with environmental organizations who want to apply impossible standards without any consideration of the risk we are taking in managing public lands in such a capricious manner.
The Southern Sierra Messenger is published every other Thursday at Springville, California; Mail subscriptions are available; Rates are $24 per year within Tulare County and $32 per year outside Tulare County; US addresses only. Send subscription order with payment to Community Media, PO Box 765, Springville, CA 93265 or call (559) 539-7514.
See also our previous post on this topic [here].
California Lightning Fires Update
On June 20 and 21 dry lightning raked California. Over 2,000 fires were ignited and nearly a million acres burned. Most of those fires have been contained, but thirty-eight are still burning outside containment lines. Here are some updates on a few notable uncontained fires, nearly a month after ignition:
Lime Complex Fires, Shasta-Trinity NF
Situation as of 07/17/08 6:30 PM
Total Personnel: 1,312
Size: 102,776 acres (USFS, 84,493 ac, CalFire, 18,283 ac.)
Percent Contained: 64%
Costs to Date: $28,019,000 (Lime Complex Fires: $25,928,000, Yolla Bolly Complex Fires: $2,091,000)
Personnel continued burning and holding indirect line on the Miners Fire, and contructing line around the spots to the south of the Lime Fire (12,950 ac 52%). National Guard units continued holding and mop up operations.
Crews made good progress with containment goals on the Trough Fire (3,690 ac 90%).
Crews worked on containing spots to the south of the Yellow Fire (12,800 ac 0%)and continued stucture protection to the south of the fire.
Personnel continued construction of indirect line in the Yolla Bolly Wilderness with a mule team on the west side of the Vinegar Fire (25,925 ac 0%). The Vinegar Fire merged with the Sulpher [sic] Fire on 7/10, and was henceforth to be called the Wilderness2 Fire, but that pronouncement has not been followed.
No estimated date of containment has been announced for the Yellow Fire or the Vinegar Fire. The estimated date of containment for the Trough Fire is 07/30 and for the Miners Fire 08/15.
The Lime Complex is officially a megafire now, having topped 100,000 acres. It is the second CA megafire this year, the firest being the Basin/Indians Fire, now at over 205,000 acres. It remains to be seen whether the Lime Complex will top the 1999 Big Bar Fire at 141,000 acres to become the largest fire in the history of Northern California.
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The wood to rebuild Tahoe is sitting there, rotting
The following excellent essay was published last Saturday in the Sacto Bee [here]. We re-post it in full:
By William Wade Keye, professional forester
A year after the Angora fire in South Lake Tahoe, the dead trees, debris and rubble are cleared from the devastated neighborhoods. New homes are sprouting from the earth to the tune of contractors’ blaring rock music, hammers and nail guns.
Lumber to sustain the rhythm is being transported from Canada, Oregon and Washington. Dozens of structures are rising in a cacophony of recovery and new life.
It’s all taking place within the afternoon shadows cast by the thousands of dead trees that remain standing on adjacent national forest lands. Although seared and killed by high heat, inside their charred bark is unburned wood, light and bright.
Yet despite this volume of usable fiber, these cellulose skeletons will never be tapped to help build a single structure.
Rather, the trees killed by the fire will be left to rot, under assault by insects and fungi, as the U.S. Forest Service plans and plans, and then plans some more, about what to do in the aftermath of the last year’s disaster. It doesn’t want to get sued, having lost the will to fight against environmental activists and their attorneys.
Judicial decisions have broken the back of a once-proud federal agency, handing de facto control of the public’s forest to people who don’t like forestry. The wood to rebuild Tahoe is being imported from distant forests hundreds of miles away. This is called protecting the environment.
As an American citizen, I’m troubled that the Toyota Prius was engineered in Japan while Detroit was figuring out how to build a better Hummer. I also don’t understand why we, as Americans, can’t both expand our domestic energy supplies (including fossil fuels and nuclear power) and push for much greater efficiency, alternative sources and new technology.
As a forester, I don’t get the environmental benefit of burning forests down, letting them rot and then – perhaps – trying to clean them up at great expense to taxpayers. I don’t accept that we won’t look to quickly salvage and utilize dead public timber instead of sourcing our wood from living trees in someone else’s backyard, at great cost in terms of wasted energy, carbon emissions and true community. I can’t imagine why we don’t plant trees in denuded areas just as fast as we possibly can to prevent brush encroachment and deforestation.
These behaviors contribute to global warming. A wildfire such as the Angora fire emits massive amounts of greenhouse gases, followed by years of slow methane release. (Methane is 20 times more active as a global warming agent than CO2.) If, instead of allowing dead timber to decompose, we harvest and utilize it in long-lasting products and bioenergy, we can store carbon for long periods and also offset the burning of fossil fuels. Finally, by not reclaiming the site with a growing young forest, we fritter away decades of opportunity to capture and store high levels of atmospheric carbon. This is something that healthy forest ecosystems are remarkably good at doing.
All over the country there is a movement toward locally grown fruits and vegetables, organic foods and community gardens. People are demanding authenticity in terms of what they eat and where it comes from. It helps us make sense of our lives in an increasingly corporate and impersonal world.
In national forest policy, it should be Prius drivers and organic farmers who are leading the way, clamoring for local responsibility and economies of ecological authenticity. Taking wood from distant forests in order to rebuild in Tahoe should be simply unacceptable. Especially when it’s just sitting there, rotting on the stump.
Instead, we accept the grim counsel of the eco-clergy: better to do nothing than risk anything. Burn down the forest, let it go to brush, but just don’t touch it. Where our wood comes from is not important.
No wonder the Forest Service has given up on actively managing its lands, even to the extent of trying to keep them green.
Theodore Roosevelt, who set aside most of our vast system of national forests during his risk-taking years in the White House, is turning over in his grave. Roosevelt intended them to be used, not neglected. Conservation was not about minimizing risk, but about maximizing the social good.
Forestry, like sustainable agriculture, is a “can do” enterprise, as integral to the human experience as rebuilding homes after a terrible catastrophe. When we suppress something so wholesome and engaging, we kill off a bit of ourselves. We become poorer, more afraid, easier to corral into a world of diminished possibilities.
The post-wildfire blight and deforestation in Tahoe, and spreading throughout our national forests in the American West, is a Hummer we are driving, wasting resources and spewing greenhouse gases while new life – and fresh oxygen – is so abundantly available.
William Wade Keye is a California registered professional forester.
Please Donate to the Cause
W.I.S.E. is non-profit. Heck, we’re damn near non-income. But we are endeavoring against all odds to save forests and spread good information and knowledge about stewardship of our forests and landscapes.
We’re trying to save forests. We’re trying to stop or reduce the megafires that are ravaging our forests. We’re trying to make this planet a more habitable place for all life forms.
To that end we have created and are managing 12 websites. Our most recent site, W.I.S.E. Fire Tracking, is building records of the major fires burning this year, so that we can evaluate those fires after the season is over and seek ways to lessen the destruction.
We have not shirked from controversy. We have pushed the envelope. We have berated the Powers That Be for their incompetence and misguided policies that destroy forests, both public and private, and incinerate homes, farms, and ranches, and pollute the air and water, and cripple economies, and drain the Treasury.
We have endeavored to post the best, most cutting edge science, so that visitors can learn the facts for a change instead being pepper sprayed with rude and a-scientific propaganda all the time. We are a beacon, a light in the smoky darkness of a thousand forest fires burning at once.
W.I.S.E. is free. Our sites are open to all, free of charge, without a fee, buy in, ticket charge, or gate receipt.
But it is not free to do all this work. It is time consuming. Moreover, the expertise displayed here is the result of hundreds of years of combined professional effort. All of the experts published at W.I.S.E. have contributed their knowledge for free, and we are deeply grateful, but we also recognize that their expertise is hard won and represents lifetimes of dedication.
Your financial contributions are also deeply appreciated. We share this wonderful letter we received today, with gratitude:
Dear Mike,
Enclosed please find a check in the amount of $200. I hope it will help to keep your great sites going and allow you to continue to share wisdom and expertise.
As I promised myself, “a dollar a day” contribution will hopefully assist this endeavor to spread the word about forest health in particular and the rational study of the environment in general.
Randy
We send Randy a big Thank You. He would never admit it, but he is a victim of excruciatingly bad forest policies. His home and landscape are under tremendous threat. His area has been visited by fire storms emanating from mis-managed federal forests and hundreds of his neighbors’ homes have been incinerated by those fire storms. There is little he can do to change those terrible policies on his own.
But W.I.S.E. is attempting to do just that. We want to save rural homes from predicted, preventable fires. We desire to save the taxpayers $billions in emergency fire costs by encouraging the application of restoration forestry to millions of acres, thereby rendering forest safe and resilient to fire and far less prone to catastrophic destruction by holocaust. We wish to protect, maintain, and perpetuate forests, wildlife habitat, watersheds, airsheds, recreation opportunities, and all the other amenities and values that forests provide us. We are deeply cognizant of the heritage of our landscapes, and promote the respect and restoration that our heritage deserves.
That is our quest. Little by little we are having an effect. Top policy makers are reading our sites. The pendulum is being swung, the elephant is slowly moving.
Your contributions make it possible for W.I.S.E. to pursue this quest. Our budget is threadbare. We can barely pay our monthly Internet fees. But with your help we will persevere.
Your contributions are tax deductible. The Western Institute for Study of the Environment is a 501(c)(3) non-profit collaboration of environmental scientists, practitioners, and the interested public.
W.I.S.E. provides a free, on-line set of post-graduate courses in environmental studies, currently fifty Topics in eight Colloquia, each containing book and article reviews, original papers, and essays. In addition, we present two Commentary sub-sites, a news clipping sub-site, and the W.I.S.E. Fire Tracking site.
Our mission is to further advancements in knowledge and environmental stewardship across a spectrum of related environmental disciplines and professions. We teach and advocate good stewardship and caring for the land.
Please help us out. Please visit our donations page [here].
Thank you.
What’s Wrong with NASA?
In a recent news post at W.I.S.E. Forest, Fire, and Wildlife News entitled “What’s Wrong with the Sun? (Nothing According to NASA)” NASA scientist David Hathaway is quoted as claiming that the extended and continuing lull in sunspots is “normal” [here]. The fact that Solar Cycle 24 is one to two years late is nothing to worry about, says Hathaway at NASA.
It’s not the same as when your girlfriend is “late.” Now that’s something to worry about!
We did point out editorially that:
The stat babble in this article is misleading. The article states “the ongoing lull in sunspot number is well within historic norms for the solar cycle” but historic norms include long lulls such as the Maunder Minimum. The article states the 142 month decaying Solar Cycle 23 is “within a standard deviation.” That is a meaningless statistic since non-linear cycle lengths are not normally distributed.
The word “normal” is used in this article with two different meanings. Statistical normal is not the same as common usage normal. The article confuses the two.
Facts: Solar Cycle 24 still overdue by more than a year and solar magnetic activity is low, indicating that Solar Cycle 24, when it does show up, will be very weak.
The use of “standard deviations” by NASA in this case is a misuse of statistics. It implies a level of confidence that is entirely too much, inappropriate, and statistically invalid. Wm. “Matt” Briggs expands and expounds on this and other issues of uncertainty in his fine blog, William M. Briggs, Statistician [here].
About W.I.S.E. Fire Tracking
This Spring W.I.S.E. initiated a Fire Tracking site [here]. We have been endeavoring to track the larger fires in the West. So far we have tracked over 110 fires, many still active.
The way W.I.S.E. Fire Tracking works is that each fire (that we choose to track) gets it’s own post. That post is updated periodically. We try to update on a daily basis while the fire is active, but some days the information is not available.
If a fire you are interested in is not on the main page (it only holds 15 posts), then there are a few ways you can find it. First, try typing the name of the fire in the search applet in the upper righthand sidebar. Second, you can click on the “state” category if you know what state the fire is in. Third, if you know what month the fire started, you can look in the archives under that month.
For each fire we are attempting to post daily stats for acreage, personnel, percent containment, and suppression costs to date. That way each post becomes a historical record for that fire. You can see how the fire grew day by day, along with the changes in the other stats. That’s something InciWeb doesn’t do.
W.I.S.E. Fire Tracking is in blog form, designed for feedback. People on the scene, or anywhere else for that matter, can contribute information, photos, or ask questions. It’s a two-way communication, something else InciWeb does not do.
W.I.S.E. Fire Tracking is free. It costs the taxpayers nothing. That’s definitely not the case with InciWeb. Your donations are sincerely appreciated, in any case.
Unlike other fire sites, W.I.S.E. Fire Tracking is not designed by and for firefighters. Our expertise and concern is about forests and other landscape types, and so we can provide indepth analysis regarding the effects of a particular fire on multiple forest values and resources. By collecting and posting the daily record for each fire, we are establishing the basic information needed to analyze fire effects.
InciWeb, the government fire reporting site, has been up and down this year. Right now it is functional again. If the InciWebbers show they can report fires consistently and without server glitches, we may pick and choose which fires we track more selectively. Our intention was never to compete with InciWeb or supplant them. We only provided a comprehensive fire reporting service because we thought such was needed during their long absence.
Due to the workload involved with W.I.S.E. Fire Tracking, the other subsites at W.I.S.E. have been neglected. Sorry about that. Hopefully in a week or two the fire season will calm down a bit and the other subsites will get more attention.
In that regard, if you feel like reviewing a new book or paper of exceptional quality and cutting-edge, new paradigm thinking in the environmental sciences, please do so. We are always happy to post contributions from the experts.
For those select few among you to whom we have promised specific projects, please bear with us. We have not forgotten. The list is still right here on the W.I.S.E. bulletin board. Your project is circled in red. We will get to it when we can and eventually for sure.
Please take some time to explore W.I.S.E. Fire Tracking. There is a wealth of information being collected there. Sometimes you may need to read between the lines because the whole truth is only hinted at. Your analysis of specific fires is also welcome, as are your photos, maps, and on-the-ground observations.
