Wildfire
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The recent blaze that destroyed much of Altadena, California was an urban fire ignited by wind-driven embers. Photo by George Wuerthner A new report from Headwaters Economics concludes that 1,100 communities scattered across the country are vulnerable to urban wildfires, such as the recent Altadena and Pacific Palisades blazes in California. While the origins of…
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Here we go again. Yet another article “Bill plans to use livestock grazing to lower wildfire risk” about how livestock grazing can reduce wildfires. It seems that every month or so, someone (without much knowledge of fire ecology or even grazing impacts) rediscovers the fairy tale that fuel reduction by grazing will preclude large wildfires.…
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On January 7th, Santa Ana winds up to 100 mph whipped across the San Gabriel Mountains near Los Angeles. A blaze ignited in Eaton Canyon created a shower of embers that rained down on the community of Altadena that destroyed more than 9,000 structures and killed 17 people. The source of the blaze is still…
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Congress is considering Fix Our Forests legislation. The legislation is a Trojan Horse that seeks to increase fuel reductions on public lands through logging and prescribed burns. However, large wildfires are ultimately not controlled by fuels. Fires need fuel to ignite, but they only spread when the climate/weather is conducive to ignition and the spread…
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Chad Hanson is a research ecologist and the director of the John Muir Project of Earth Island Institute, located in Big Bear City, California. Dr. Hanson has a Ph.D. in ecology from the University of California at Davis, with a research focus on fire ecology in conifer forest ecosystems, and he is the author of…
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A recent Bend Bulletin Editorial repeated the numerous misconceptions about prescribed burning. The commentary suggested that more prescribed burning would reduce smoke in Bend during the summer months. While I agree that less smoke would be a great outcome, prescribed burning will not accomplish that for several reasons. First, much of the smoke we experience…
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The Forest Service spends billions of dollars fighting fires and implementing fuel treatments like logging and prescribed burns to reduce large wildfires. A further problem with the emphasis on logging the forest is that a significant acreage charred each year is in non-forested landscapes like sagebrush, grasslands, and chaparral where “fuel reductions” by logging have…
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One can wonder if the rebuttal of logging and prescribed fire by myself and other conservationists as a flawed strategy to protect communities is gaining traction. I cannot often report on favorable bi-partisan legislation regarding wildfire issues. However, a recently introduced bill by Congressional Huffman (D) and Jay Obernolte (R) of California puts the government…
