Study: No increased fire threat in owl habitat

[depakid]

GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) — A new study challenges a basic justification about the threat of wildfires that the Bush administration used to make room for more logging in old growth forests that are home to the northern spotted owl. The study, appearing in the journal Conservation Biology, found no increasing threat of severe wildfires destroying old growth forests in the drier areas where the owl lives in Oregon, Washington and Northern California.

"The argument used to justify a massive increase in logging under the (spotted owl) recovery program was not based on sound science," said Chad T. Hanson, a fire and forest ecologist at the University of California, Davis, who was lead author of the study. "The recovery plan took a leap-before-you-look approach and did it without sound data."

The spotted owl was declared a threatened species in 1990 primarily due to heavy logging in old growth forests. Its numbers continue to decline, despite sharp reduction in logging on federal lands in 1994 that caused economic pain still felt in the region.

The Bush administration agreed to produce a new spotted owl recovery plan to settle a timber industry lawsuit. The plan blamed declining owl numbers on the barred owl, an aggressive East Coast cousin that has driven spotted owls from their territory, and on wildfires that have destroyed old growth forests. It eliminated habitat reserves in the Northwest Forest Plan and proposed aggressive thinning in the dry forests of the Klamath Mountains and the east side of the Cascades to reduce the threat of fire.

The Obama administration told a federal court last April it would not defend the Bush administration's plan because an inspector general's report concluded it had been politically manipulated. The administration is negotiating over the scope and timing for a review with conservation groups that filed lawsuits. "By July 30 we should know how we are going to proceed," U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service spokeswoman Joan Jewett said. "We will be reviewing the study, which is just the type of information we'll be considering as we determine what, if any, changes need to be made to the spotted owl recovery plan."

The study took satellite imagery on fire severity from 1984-2005, and compared it with government data identifying old growth forests on the east side of the Cascades in Oregon, Washington and California, and the Klamath Mountains of southern Oregon and California — all identified in the recovery plan as having the highest fire danger.

The rate of high-severity wildfires in old growth was 1.34 percent on the east side of the Cascades, and 1.74 percent in the Klamath Mountains, the study found. That amounts to a high-severity fire burning a given piece of old growth forest every 746 years on the east side of the Cascades, and every 575 years in the Klamaths.

The recovery plan looked at smaller portions of the landscape than the study and shorter periods of time, and extrapolated those results to reach its conclusions, Hanson said. "The existing recovery plan is so clearly based on these incorrect assumptions that you can't just tweak it here and amend it here and fix it," Hanson said.

More: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5grJD1uMs91HJN1la9BUoloaChTHAD9997MFG2

[zbdent]

1. wait a minute ... you're telling me that President Jesus Appointed Me Bush lied?

:wow:

[Birdiesmom]

2. zbdent, I think you made me piddle in my pants.

:applause:

[Fotoware58]

3. Burnt Biscuit??

With the Bisuit Fire burning 500,000 acres, and a full one third of Oregon's protected "owl circles" burned up, I think that old Chad Hanson doesn't care that ancient forests are going up in smoke. Hanson is the same guy who files lawsuits against projects which cut hazardous dead trees along roadways. I see that he has added a new title to his repertoire, now, as well. Yep, filing lawsuits against the Forest Service is QUITE lucrative for him and his eco-lawyer wife.

[depakid]

4. Any comments on the findings?

Or are aspersions all you have to cast?

[Fotoware58]

5. Literary License?

There's a few omissions from this article that the editor "forgot" to include. The "findings" were that in old growth on the Coast Range of Oregon would not benefit from "fuels reduction projects". This was the only area where carbon sequestration was not maximized with thinning/fuels reduction projects. The other areas were found to sequester more carbon when they were thinned and fire intensities were diminished. When the "findings" are applied to public lands within the Coast Ranges containing old growth, I'll bet that those lands are already protected as owl habitat. <smirk>

Chad Hanson is, to me, just as "tainted" and biased as the Wise groups are to you guys. I'm no more of a Wise Use(r) than the rest of you. We have no "divine right" to "reap the harvest".

[PufPuf23]

6. Study: No increased fire threat in owl habitat

This article is misleading.

The National Forest lands in the Klamath/Siskiyou Mountain landscape are not all NOS nesting or feeding habitat and the study apparently is limited to still existing NOS nesting habitat rather than the landscape as a whole over time.

If one extends the period of study from 1977 (Hog Fire) and include the catastrophic fire years of 2006 to 2008, there has been more NOS nesting habitat lost to wildfire than was lost to the industrial logging in the bioregion in the period 1950-1994. Large scale timber extraction in the region did not begin until post WWII.

I am not defending salvage logging nor the tree farming approach to forest management for the Klamath Mountains; however, harvest of older timber has been less than 3% of what occurred annually between 1950 and 1994 even under GWB. I am happy that much of these National Forest lands have been preserved in federal Wilderness, National Recreation Areas, and Late Successional Reserves.

At lower elevations Douglas-fir predominates the mixed evergreen and mixed conifer stands with true fir species dominant at higher elevations. There were/are few trees older than 300 years old meaning that stand replacement events (typically fire) occured on a less than 300 year interval. This is supported in the scientific literature and in the field.

The fire pattern in fires of the past 20 years in older stands can be a ground fire or a catastrophic crown fire. Unfortunately, when the same fire hits areas already recently burned or the plantations from past patch clearcuts, the fire pattern is more often a broadcast fire that sets the area back to early seral. The stands most resistent to large fires are what I would term thrifty mature stands or those between 80-180 years since stand initiation. Older stands are fire resistent but due to dead and down material tend to burn hot when catastophic fire weather occurs and when re-burns occur. There are large areas that have burned catastrophically three times since 1977. The course that has been set is for the continuing erosion and fragmentation of nesting habitat and deforestation on poorer growing soils whether rocky or harsh south slopes and higher elevations.

The answers that I support and that are scientifically defensible are thinning of young and older thrifty stands (including leaving legacies in stand structure where present), plantation brush removal and thinning, extensive systems of maintained shaded fuel breaks on roads and ridges, and more fire suppression infractructure (fire fighting personal locally back at historic levels from 1960-1990). The current let it burn policy has been thoughtless in implementation and a huge waste of monies and OG dependent species habitat. The situation will worsen if policies are not changed because of the reburns.

[Fotoware58]

7. Thank you, "pufpuf"

Your progressive and scientific way of thinking moves you to the head of the class. It is going to take every technique in the forester's toolbox to restore and adapt forests to changes, past, present and future. If we don't intervene in "unnatural" stands, we will lose the option of restoration when bugs and fires destroy those forests. Our only options after that are rehabilitation or permanent brushfields.

Bravo on the post, bud!

[PufPuf23]

8. Here is a current example of the re-burn problem.

Thanks for the props. I have a long and varied background in forestry and testified before several Congressional subcommittees circa 1990-92 as a forester/ecologist or economist. I also grew up and am now semi-retired in the interior Klamath Mountains. I was on the 5 person sociology-economics scoping group as a consultant to the Governor's Office for the State of California and my name is in the Acknowledgements section in the Introduction to the 1992(or 93?) NOS Recovery Plan.

Odd thing about DU is that I perceive myself as an anti-war New (better) Deal moderate Democrat but this puts me to the far left. The other thing is that I am most hesitant to post about subjects where one would think I have the most to offer.

"The Backbone Fire is burning on the Shasta-Trinity and Six Rivers National Forests approximately 36 miles northeast of Willow Creek in the Trinity Alps Wilderness. Formerly called the Lower Trinity 17, on the Six Rivers National Forest, the fire was one of many ignited by lightning on the evening of July first. Firefighters quickly extinguished most of the fires. The remaining lightning fires have all been declared controlled and contained at this time. Backbone was the only fire that continued to grow, until it overtook and combined with the Trinity Fire that was located on the Shasta-Trinity National Forests.


Due to the complexity of the fire situation the Atlanta based National Incident Management Organization (NIMO) assumed command of the fire on Wednesday July 8th. The fire is burning within the footprint of the 1999 Megram Fire. Standing dead snags, dead and down logs are actively burning on exposed southwest facing slopes.


Forest Service officials are working closely with the Hoopa Tribe and keeping tribal members and fire service personnel updated on the Backbone Fire. Protection of cultural sites within the fire area is a priority."


link with map and detail: http://www.inciweb.org/incident/1716/

[truedelphi]

10. Thank you for posting this.

Incidentally it is interesting to get on board a forum and find out that one is considered a pinko communist, when thirty years ago the ideas one expresses would have been accepted by Repuglicans! As well as by Democrats.
This country has moved so far to the right I keep thinking that I should be waking up each morning in Spain. And not today's Spain, but Franco's Spain!

[Fotoware58]

11. Great Decision

The forest Service has decided to listen to reason and directly attack the Backbone Fire, instead of waiting for it to burn up the desired acreage. Re-burns are often more catastrophic than the original fire. The worst of the Biscuit Fire occurred within the unsalvaged 1987 Silver Fire. With a wealth of thick brush and plenty of large diameter snags, both standing and on the ground, the high-intensity flames cook the soils. This action will result in an estimated containment more than a month earlier than the Let-Burn program expected.

I guess there IS still a little wisdom and leadership left in the Forest Service.

[Fotoware58]

12. Partially true

"There were/are few trees older than 300 years old meaning that stand replacement events (typically fire) occurred on a less than 300 year interval. This is supported in the scientific literature and in the field."

In actuality, Indians shaped the look of the Coast Ranges and the Willamette Valley more than you realize. The reason there aren't any trees older than 300 years old is that Indians burned most of the conifers out, preferring grasses and oak trees, as well as easy to get wildlife in the savannas they created, skillfully using fire to ensure their survival. Historical sketches and written accounts of what was there when pioneers arrived proves that Indians had profound effects on the environments they created. What is there now is also a product of man's interventions.

Also not included in your analysis is the fact that when loggers are out there working, their firefighting skills and equipment are closer to the ignition points. Initial attacks and response times are much more effective.

Unfortunately, the main task right now is to convince the public that today's wildfires are NOT good for our forests.

[PufPuf23]

13. Note that I specified the Klamath and Siskiyou Mountains

where Douglas-fir older than 300 years are and were rare and virtually all older Douglas-fir have survived repeated lower intensity fires. These forests are less mesic than coastal rain forest Douglas-fir stands and tend to fall apart from root and bole fungi and windthrow followed by stand replacement wildfire on a more frequent cycle, whether set by lightning or Indians or early settlers. Five hundred to 800 year old Douglas-fir were not uncommon from BC down to the redwood region in the more mesic coastal forests before the forests were exploited by industry.

There has been a large species shift to Douglas-fir from black oak or white oak woodlands in the coast ranges from exclusion of fire by whatever agent in the last 100 years.

I have been more than once around the block in all the items you mention; the reason I posted in this thread is because many of today's wildfires are wasteful in cost of habitat, forests, and monies because of policy; and I agree that stand structures (as a result of human interaction or choice of non-action) have created a situation where catastrophic and repeated wildfires are a problem to be addressed or the situation will grow ever worse.

[lk9650]

9. interesting

hmmm