Yet another "Let-Burn" mistake!!

[Fotoware58]

http://www.sltrib.com/ci_13236927

"New Harmony » Gov. Gary Herbert on Sunday joined critics questioning why the 10,000-acre Mill Flat fire that destroyed at least three structures and threatened more than 600 others was not suppressed earlier."

THIS is the future of the Forest Service and our treasured Federal forestlands! With 26 million more acres of designated wilderness promised by the Democrats (ESPECIALLY easterners!), locking out good stewardship, we can expect more of these tragic and preventable events!

[hedgehog]

1. From what I can see, the problem is that people refuse to recognize

that Western forests are different than Eastern forests. Some forests are meant to burn regularly. If you want to live in those forests, you have to take that into consideration and build accordingly. A cedar shingle roof may work just fine in Maine, not so much in California or Utah.

[Warpy]

2. People in Maine don't use them, either

because so many heat with wood. Sparks from the chimney on a cedar shake roof are bad juju.

In fact, here in NM, the only places I see with cedar shake roofs were built by California transplants. The locals use metal or ceramic if they have money, asphalt shingles if they don't.

However, the point that western forests are meant to burn over every few years is well taken. The trick is to do them often enough to clean brush and ground trash, not to let it build up to the point it will be a crown fire.

Nobody likes to look out their kitchen window onto a burned over forest floor, but the alternative is complete devastation including that window.

[hedgehog]

5. I think one of the most suprising results of the periodic burning

policy is how quickly everything greens up afterward. Yeah, it can be ugly until it recovers, but that's the way it is.

[Fotoware58]

9. Rule of thumb

"Prepared fire" = good

Let-burn fire = BAD

Fire does NOT have to be "reintroduced".....because it has never left! However, it DOES need to be "re-invented" back into the valuable tool that the American Indians used so well. Read the works of Dr. Stephen Pyne, the world's foremost expert on wildfires and anthropogenic fires. You'll be entertained and enlightened!!

[Fotoware58]

3. Ummmm....

The homeowners lived in a city and the fire raged right to their doorstep. Don't blame people for living in a rural area. The Forest Service SCREWED UP! Where will they screw-up NEXT! AND, you don't know if those homes have wood on their roofs! The high winds were "Santa Ana-like" and unless you live in a cave, it doesn't take much of a spark to torch your home. The government is suppose to be responsible for the safety of its citizens, instead of being responsible for burning their homes down.
Yes, we CAN manage forests into resilient, healthy forests that don't burn at high intensity. However, that just isn't "politically-palatable" in this day and age. Secretary Vilsack TRIED to tell people in his last speech but, that fell on deaf ears!

[hedgehog]

4. The problem is that until scientists realized that the forests

had to burn periodically, the policy was to suppress all fires. Now the situation is that there is a tremendous amount of fuel built up. It's a problem without an easy solution.

Still - if you look at classic Mediterranean buildings, they are made of stone, brick or concrete and have no brush around them. There may be a tree or two set in a flower bed, but the house is surrounded by a stone or concrete patio. That is the time proven method of living in a dry forest.

Farmers had to learn new methods as they moved to the dry lands. Builders and home owners must do the same.

[Fotoware58]

6. Not at all!!

"It's a problem without an easy solution."

We KNOW the solution! It's just not a solution that the government and the courts and the eco-lawyers LIKE! Soooo, in the meantime, I guess we'll just have to enjoy the smoke and destruction, eh?

[hedgehog]

7. So, what is the solution? You can't just keep suppressing fires and allowing

fuel to build up. Maybe there can be some government assistance to help people build fire breaks around their houses.

[Fotoware58]

8. The solution is....

eco-forestry and then, a regular program of prescribed fires. We know that we need to reduce stocking levels and fuel loading. We know that we need to restore species composition, as well.

Alas, the eco-forestry part won't be allowed. Obama's campaign contributors won't stand for it. Eastern Democrats want more wilderness, despite the wildfire danger. The solution for another 26 million acres will be locked out when they are magically made off-limits to good forest stewardship. Also, rehabilitation of those burned areas will also be locked out when salvage logging is eliminated. Again, the Democrats solution to burned forests is to burn them again. The land just cannot take that kind of abuse. Partisan politics will trump science. It happened with Clinton and it happened with Bush and it is happening with Obama.

[hedgehog]

11. It's possible that the best solution is to get in there and log off

these areas. That's one way to remove the fuel buildup. Few people realize that National Forests as opposed to National Parks were set aside specifically to supply timber; these areas were meant to be logged. But how can we tell when someone wants to log the area to make money and improve the health of the forest while doing it and when someone wants to log the area to make money and will say anything necessary to get permission?

[Fotoware58]

12. Logging?!?

That option is simply off-the-table right now. The political climate is all about our elected officials pumping up their "green creds". Every single eastern Democrat voted for more western wilderness. Even eastern Republicans are voting for it. It's a no-brainer ( heh heh ) for them and almost political suicide to NOT vote for it. However, many western Democrats do NOT want more land locked up and doomed to die. This is simply a "political fact of life". The courts will always shoot down the logging plans because of the tangle of conflicting rules, laws and policies covering our National Forests.

Yes, it IS sad that forest are burning with such anger and force. We are reaping what we have sown. Until people like Sierra Clubbers accept the facts and see the damage, forest destruction WILL continue!

[hedgehog]

13. My take on this is that we are learning that forests are always in flux.

A forest that isn't changing is sick and dying. The problem is that people see a climax forest and expect the forest to always look that way. A certain amount of logging is probably the best compromise between health and appearance. We need people to speak up for responsible logging. It's not as profitable as clear cutting, but there has to be a balance.

[Fotoware58]

14. No one...

is proposing to clearcut our National Forests. Eco-forestry is the way to go but, why is the Sierra Club STILL against it?!?! The "slippery slope" argument is resulting in destroyed landscapes. Forest ARE "sick and dying"! It takes a lot of imagination to ignore 7 MILLION acres of completely dead forests and an additional 6 MILLION acres of wildfires this year, alone.

I've seen where eco's have warned of "clearcutting the Roadless Areas". THAT just isn't so! Just like other "deniers", people will do anything or tell any lie to keep forests locked up. Forest disaster deniers! They use the same old tired rhetoric like; "forests have done just fine for 10,000 years without man". Well, they sure seem to not be doing "just fine" right now.

THROW OUT THE PAST!!! The future of our forests is slipping away and most people embrace this ongoing disaster. Secretary Vilsack's speech fell on deaf ears. "Obama's Katrina" rolls on like a tsunami over our western forests.

[hedgehog]

17. I'd have to say the most important thing we've learned in the last 20 years

is that there hasn't been a virgin landscape in North America since the end of the last Ice Age. People have been controlling and manipulating the flora and fauna to suit themselves since they walked across the Bering Strait. It's only recently that Western science has recognized this.

I am always fascinated by people who consider a wilderness to be a landscape that excludes every other human except themselves.

We do need to throw out a past divided between people who wanted to clear cut and people who wanted everything left untouched. During the Bush and Regan years, people who wanted only to make a fast buck presented themselves as stewards of the land. It's understandable that people concerned about the environment would mistrust the timber industry today. Still, if we want to save the forests, we need to get past that.

Thank you for your responses. I've learned something.

[Fotoware58]

18. And, thank you...

for having an open mind and recognizing that what some people call "pristine", others call anthropogenic. Indians tended their lands so, why can't we tend OURS!?!?!

BTW, the last clearcut I helped install was back in 1989, and that was a bug-killed patch of trees. Yes, we did leave snags for wildlife so, technically, it isn't a clearcut.

Also, here in California, the Forest Service has VOLUNTARILY banned claercutting since 1993, for the good of the unlisted California Spotted Owl (and the landscape), because it was the right thing to do.

[Fotoware58]

10. We NEED

forests that survive droughts. We NEED forests that resist bark beetles. We NEED forests that survive wildfires.

Slapping a "Wilderness" sticker on unhealthy forests is poor protection against today's firestorms.

More on blaming residents. Let's use another analogy. The use of air conditioning across this country represents a HUGE impact on our environment in the form of coal and nuclear-powered energy. Sooooo, let's eliminate all air conditioning because, it's "natural" and because it's destructive and because corporations make HUGE profits. If residents die, it's their own fault! What did people do before air conditioning? If they don't like it, they can certainly move to where they won't need air conditioning. North Dakota has LOTS of room. Ditto for eastern Montana and many other states that have a "naturally" cool climate.

A "chilling" parallel, eh? Tens of millions of people are at risk and they are being blamed for living where they live.

[happyslug]

15. The "Leave it burn" policy was driven by legal liability more then any other factor

People tend to forget that if you start a fire, any fire, and it gets out of hand then the person who started that fire is liable for ALL of the Damages caused by that fire.

On the other hand, if the fire is started "naturally" (What the law calls an "Act of God") then the person whose property is damages suffers the lost, NOT the Government even if the Government did NOTHING to stop the fire (and had done fire suppression previously).

The best solution would be prescribed fires set by the Forest Service to burn off excess tender in the forest. The problem is if such a fire gets out of hand then the Forest Service has to pay for any and all damages. If on the other hand the fire is started naturally and the Forest Service does NOTHING to stop it then the loss is on the individual home/land owner NOT the Forest Service.

Thus the reason the "Let it burn" policy was adopted was to get around the above liability. If the Fire starts naturally (or by a third party such as an arson, car, Camper, hunter etc) then the FOREST SERVICE is NOT liable for any damage caused by the fire. If the fire started naturally, then the owner of the property damages must bear the loss, if it was caused by a third party (arson, Car, Camper, Hunter etc) then if such a third party can be found then only that third party is liable (And given the amount of damage and the lack of resources such third parties generally have not worth suing).

Once you realize that the Government wants to avoid liability for any harm caused by these fires and the only way that can be done if the fire starts "Naturally" and left to burn (The Government had no duty to even try to put out a fire). Thus why the "let it burn" policy was adopted. No one wanted the Forest Service being held liable for damages to homes if a control fire went out of control and the only way to do that AND have fires was to adopt the "Let it Burn" policy.

[Fotoware58]

16. So true!

But, doesn't the government have a responsibilty for public safety, as well?!?! To safeguard essential "natural services" like drinking water? To supply natural resources, like timber, as per the Organic Act?? To reduce flooding and sedimentation of streams and rivers?

I totally agree with your take on this but, it doesn't end with that reality. Since the government has been locked out of the forest management arena, they feel like they need to do something else, and that is the Let-Burn fires that purport to have "resource benefits". However, they refuse to spell out those "resource benefits" while forests are destroyed, people lose their lives and property is incinerated.

[Fotoware58]

19. Federal "gambling"?

Basically, the Let-Burn program is a gamble that the Feds are doing without the legally-required proper NEPA work done, INCLUDING local input. Locals will have to endure not only the health hazards and fire danger of an uncontrolled fire but, they also have to deal with the "unintended consequences", like flooding and the ugliness of a fire-scarred landscape.

The chances of the Feds getting a "jackpot" out of these Let-Burn fires is about the same as getting one at a remote Nevada gas station slot machine.