Fires | Leslie Patten Books: Wild Places, Sacred Spaces

Playing with Fire

Posted on March 15, 2010 by Leslie

Fire have always fascinated and followed me. As a kid I played with matches, but who didn’t. I grew up in Hollywood, not too far from the ‘Hollywood’ sign and next to lots of open space hills. I had my fire escape route planned out by the time I was 4. I’d lay awake at night thinking about the 2 or 3 things I’d grab when the big one came. At 6 years old, the Big One did come. My mother was out of town; my father and big sister were at the movies, and I was with the babysitter. A large out of control fire was roaring up the hillside near the Observatory, just blocks from my house, at night. The babysitter awakened me to tell me we had to evacuate. I watched that night fire so close to my house. It was a beautiful sight. Huge sparks fell on my house roof. I didn’t want to leave.

During the summers it was routine to watch the brush fires being fought by the fire department from my house. I even remember watching and eating cookies. One summer when I was nine, at a camp on Catalina Island an hour from Avalon, a large fire broke out. Only myself and another girl were around. We pulled the fire alarm, alerted the rest of the campers, and let the horses loose.

As I grew up and moved to Northern California, many times I was the first one at a house fire or wildfire and called the Fire Department. I’ve never fought a fire, but fire seemed to always be part of my experience. Given another lifetime, I think I’d go to the Fire Science School at U of Nevada.

So when my retired fire fighter friend woke up yesterday morning and said “Let’s burn the big brush pile”, I thought “YES”. Its the brush pile I’ve written about before, the leftovers from the logging they did this winter.

Brush pile before we burned. Dog for reference of size.

There’s several of them scattered over many different properties. I don’t have land on the forest, so I don’t have any of my own. But my absentee neighbor had a huge one and it was blocking my perfect view. I certainly didn’t want to look at that thing all summer, and I’ve been trying to help him figure out how he could get help, since he lives so far away, to burn it.

The weather’s been warm and the snow is gone. But several nights ago we had a light dusting and it was a cold, high humidity day. With the ground still frozen and the wind low, here was our chance.

I’ve been learning a lot from my friend G. about fire and burning. We’ve burned a lot of brush piles together from my upper cabin area, piles of beetle killed and infested pines. But this pile was humongous, at least 75′ x 30′ x 12′ high! There were lots of big logs as well as brush in there. It was dry and it was going to alight easily.

We started as the sun was going down. With the cooler temperature and higher humidity, and less chance of wind, the evening is the best time for a burn like this. G. began by lighting the pile from 4 or 5 different sides and directions. Pretty soon both ends came together and, here’s the video…

I put the dog at the end for reference. By the way, I was filming from that far back because it was hot. ‘Hotter than hell’ as they say.

Soon night came. We were out there for hours. I laid down and watched the sparks rise high against the night sky. Fire whorls burst out in small areas, like white hot tornadoes, reminding me of a witches’ brew.

The fire as night fell quickly. The stars came out. See person on right side for scale.

I could see the fire from my bedroom window. It’s not too far from my house. Periodically during the night I’d awaken and look out the window. Always it was burning, burning. That night I had the funniest dream: While in the mountains, someone said “haven’t you read the news”. I hadn’t. “There’s been an economic meltdown and fires are burning all over the city.” Meltdown, fire, economy…funny connections.

By morning it had burned down and we chunked the pile together with a loader. It had been a fantastic night.

Fun's over.

Filed under: Fires | Tagged: Burning brush piles, Fire | 1 Comment »

Radiant Heat

Posted on February 18, 2010 by Leslie

Its time for another post about beetles, clearcuts, burns, and all that goes with that.

Beetles are demolishing the conifers of our western forests. Rising temperatures, years of fire suppression policies, and natural cycles contribute to these changes in our forests. Its also worth saying that conifers have been around for eons of time, way before insects and angiosperms were on this planet. At one time you can imagine the whole world covered with conifers. Their successful strategy of being wind pollinated has allowed them to disperse and survive.

So what’s the fuss?

In the end its all about saving structures. Man-made structures like our homes. And money of course. I don’t disagree with that in essence. But I do think there is a way to work with nature, taking as much into account as is humanly possible.

Because there is money from the state only this year, rather than over 5 years time, my neighbors had incentive to almost clear cut the forest on their properties, for essentially free. But the caveat was that the loggers got the dollars and useable wood, leaving the slash piles for the homeowners to take care of. Thus, there are humongous piles all over the woods now, if you could call what’s left ‘woods’. And the homeowners are trying to figure out what to do with these piles.

Wow, what a gigantic slash pile in front of my house in my neighbor's yard

I too was given the same incentive, but chose not to use a logging company and am looking towards doing my project in a lighter way. Of course, I don’t have the intense forest of spruce and dead fall they had. What I have is a more sparse population of Limber Pines, suffering from Blister Rust and some beetle kill.

Last year on my own I began limbing up trees starting with those around my upper cabin, with the intention of over the course of 5 years, completely limbing up all the pines. Limbing them up to 5-6′ might help the pines fend off the rust. My logic is for two reasons: first they avoid contact with the Ribes that likes to grow under and next to the pines. Ribes is a host for the rust. Second, since the rust is a type of fungus, air circulation can never hurt in helping fight fungus.

When the state forester saw I’d started limbing around the cabin, he and the fire chief were happy. Its a good step in fire prevention as well.

This year I’m selectively cutting and burning those pines that have active beetles, heavily. Its been easy to identify. The trees have pitch tubes where they are trying to pitch out the beetles. The ones that have a plethora of pitch tubes probably won’t make it. We’re cutting those and burning them on the spot.

Burn on my property

I also have trees from last year that succumbed to beetles. I’m cutting those selectively, burning the debris and using the rest as firewood. The beetles have already flown from those trees.

Then I’ll continue to limb up all the trees and burn the slash. Finally, we’ll do a night burn where we’ll fix a perimeter and burn a low fuel ground fire to clean up the soil, making it fresh for new nutritious native grasses and the young seedlings I plan to plant to replace those that died.

I’ve noticed there are few young trees amidst the old. I’ve read that in the White Pine family, as the Clarks Nutcracker distributes the seeds, the most successful germination rates are on new burn areas. Maybe that is why there are so few seedlings here, as there hasn’t been a burn in probably over 100 years.

I didn’t own any of that spruce forest that I loved to walk in daily.

Devastated spruce forest after intensive beetle logging

Filled with owls, moose, turkeys, deer, black bears, coyotes, martens, squirrels and endless other creatures, I’d see their sign, hear their sounds, and know they found cover and food there. Now the forest looks like a vast hurricane-like force came whipping through it. And although nature herself can deal some devastating blows, it didn’t have to go down this way. I would have made it a 5 year plan, slowly clearing with intention so that areas could grow in with willows and choke cherries, alders and native grasses, keeping cover as I cleared successively.

The forest now. There will be lots of blow down still to come

So what’s the fuss? Sure, it will grow back in time, although not in my time here. We humans are like a hurricane. It takes discipline and conscious effort to go forth gently. As the old adage goes: Destroying is easy. Any one can do that. Yet creating and sustaining takes work, nurturing and love. And that is what makes us truly human.

Filed under: Fires | Tagged: Fire, Pine beetles | Leave a comment »

Right as Rain

Posted on February 15, 2010 by Leslie

Its Valentines’ Day and I’m finally home.

The day was clear and beautiful. I awoke to a small bit of fresh snow and a beautiful fiery sunrise.

: Sunrise over Dead Indian

Last night I watched the elk that overwinter in my valley. I heard the recent G&F count was 1460. They come down from the Park when the weather pushes them out. This year, as last year, they were a bit on the ‘late’ side. At dusk and dawn they come out of the tree cover to feed. Here’s a herd of about 700.

: Just a small part of the large elk herd behind my house

: More elk

: Beautiful elk in their winter clothing

The herd is almost exclusively cows and their calves with a few young males, called ‘spikes’ because their antlers are barely branched, if at all.

The whole day the wolves were howling in the valley. Its mating season and I suppose its also Valentines Day for them too.

We felled some beetle infested trees on my property and did a burn that lasted till after dusk. The wolves howled. The air was still and clear. The ash fell like snowflakes. Elk grazed on the flats up above and a lone Great Horned Owl called in the low light of the sky. I’m back and everything is right as rain.

: Brush fire

Filed under: Cody Environs, Fires | Tagged: Elk, Fire, Wolf, Wyoming | 1 Comment »

Natives and Noxiousness

Posted on January 25, 2010 by Leslie

I’ve been lax in writing, between the holidays and just returning from New York City. Now I’m focused on getting back home to Wyoming, but first I have to install three jobs and the weather here isn’t cooperating. I’m itching to get home, but storm after storm is dumping on Northern California, and the ground’s too wet to plant.

I have been shocked at the pervasiveness of invasive broom species in the hills of Marin County where I’m staying.

Broom edging a meadow

Marin County is unique in ratio of open space. Since it gets 75% of its water directly from rainfall within the county, the watershed is protected, and Mt. Tamalpais contains 100’s of hiking trails.

Marin County. Gateway to lots of hiking, Mt. Tamalpais, Muir Woods.

I’m staying in an area not far from the main reservoirs. Koda and I take walks there daily, and in huge tracts of the hills, french broom has completely taken over. In fact, I can safely say that the broom has become an understory monoculture, crowding out smaller delicates like our Coast Iris, Phacelias, Monkey Flowers, wildflowers, and ferns.

It would take a county work day of the entire population to clear the hills

I’ve hiked and encountered signage saying ‘This is a test area’ to see what works better on the broom–propane torching or vinegar applications. In the past, volunteer work crews have gone out and using a special tool, pulled up the broom. We’ve been doing this for years and years in Marin. But the situation seems out of control to me now. Marin would have to have a work crew of every man, woman, and child living here for a full weekend and that might not even do the job.

Like the problems with Sudden Oak Death, I have to wonder if our fire suppression policies over the last many years have exacerbated these problems with invasives. Burning with reburns two to four years later for the sprouts have met with some success. But given the density of housing in the hillsides, the long term drought, and the dangers of ‘controlled burns’ getting out of hand, fire control probably won’t happen. And that is too bad, because, once again I’ll say it, the West is adapted to fire.

As a testimony to the wonderful adaptations of California plants to fire, look at this Madrone. One way to simulate fire in native plants i.e. rejuvenate them if they are in your yard, is too cut them back severely. Here is a Madrone tree that was cut to a stump by the CCC during their clearing of this hillside Madrone forest.

Arbutus, Madrone, resprouts after being cut to ground

You can do this with lots of natives. For example, one way to rejuvenate woody Baccharis pilularis is to cut it very severely, thereby simulating a fire. Native grasses enjoy this method as well.

I still feel that loss of natural, frequent, low fuel fires has compromised our landscapes. Pathogens build up in the soil; invasives take hold more easily; soil depletion occurs due to lack of nitrogen fixing plant material which is first to regenerate after a fire; understory growth has built up providing massive amounts of fuel for hotter, more deadly fires. Just compare the first photo of the monoculture of broom with the cleared Madrone forest photo. I can’t be sure but I am guessing that forest was manually cleared because it sits on a ridgeline dividing the watershed open space and a residential section in the canyon below. It probably serves as a firebreak.

Of course, all the open space can’t be hand cleared. With the massive build up of fuel in the form of invasive broom, as well as other types of chaparrel that hasn’t burned in years, Californians are preparing for some big fires ahead.

Filed under: Fires | Tagged: California natives, Fire, Marin County hiking | 2 Comments »

Beetle infested forest–How I would have approached it

Posted on December 13, 2009 by Leslie

View of the forest next to my home last winter

Here is the little forest next to my property last winter

This small forest is almost exclusively spruce. Springs from higher up feed the area, making it swampy in many places. The springs are on public land; the forest you see in the photo is on the private lands of several homeowners. It is a small island of conifers surrounded on both sides by meadow. The springs run through and feed into Elk Creek, a wetland drainage with willows harboring moose most of the year.

I walked the forest everyday last year. Many of the spruce were either downed, standing dead, infested or going to be infested. It wasn’t easy to walk through the forest with so much deadfall. Yet these spruce were old growth, up to 200 years or more. The forest harbored at least three kinds of owls, moose, bear, deer, coyotes, turkeys, and lots of birds. Wolves traveled through on occasion. Hawks fed on smaller birds and squirrels. I’d seen weasel tracks. The forest was alive all the time, and changing.

The State of Wyoming acquired some funds to clear beetle infested areas around structures as part of their fire prevention program. Homeowners were offered so many dollars to clear around their structures up to several acres. The homeowners who owned these woods pooled the dollars offered by the State, and with the State Forester’s help, hired a local logging contractor to clear the woods. It was recommended that all deadfall, standing dead, infested, and larger trees (even if not infested on the premise that they’d soon be infested) be removed. Aspens were to remain. Young spruce would remain. The money was there, now, this year only, so the homeowners decided to do the complete logging job in one fell swoop. Here is what it looks like today, from the same viewpoint.

In the photo below, the area thick with trees on the right is National Forest property. The left side is the private lands. One thing to note is that on the National Forest side, although there are some spruce, its steeper (not visible in photo), therefore drier, and has predominately Douglas firs, not yet infested.

You can see the fence divide between National forest & Private cuts

OK, personally, here is how I would have done it. First, I’d assume a seven year plan. I’d use the money available the first year and do the logging by hand, therefore preventing all the compaction and destruction caused by the large machinery.

Around any structures I would have cleared all infested and dead trees, leaving a fire break near the structure.

Next I would have selected ‘red trees’, that is, dead standing trees with their needles still attached. These trees can be torches and should be removed.

Then I would clear the forest floor by doing burns in place where possible. The giant brush piles in the photo above will burn so hot that it will take a lot of time for the grass to return.

That would be my priority for the first year. I would put the forest on a seven to ten year plan of slowly clearing, opening up areas selectively for the regeneration of Aspen and Willows. The forest certainly needed attention as there probably hasn’t been fires here in over 100 years. By slowly clearing, animal homes and cover would be saved and new habitat created naturally. Many animals used this forest as a corridor to travel yet stay hidden, especially moose. The moose used the shade in hot afternoons after browsing on the willows in the marsh areas below.

In addition, now I can see my neighbors. This could have been prevented. Being that none of this forest is on my property, I really had no clout, only an opinion that I voiced. But the fear of rampant fire seemed to cloud and dominant, as well as the available funding and the recommendations of the State agencies funding the project.

It will take years to regenerate even a little bit of cover. Eventually, though not in my lifetime, Aspens will take over this area and that is a good thing. The Willows will come first, but even before that I predict a giant infestation of Canadian thistle that will need to be hand controlled. By clearing slowly, methodically, with sensitivity, the forest could regenerate at a more natural pace.

Tonight I caught a program on NPR about deforestation in Indonesia. The Indonesian government has been giving private logging firms the right to log ancient community forests. The local indigenous peoples are starving without their food source–the forest and its inhabitants. I listened to a government agent say “This forest is declining and should be cut”. Then I heard an indigenous leader say “This forest contains small streams that give us water, animals like tigers, orangutans and birds, and other animals we hunt for food, and plants we need for medicine.” I ask you: Whom of these two parties knows more about forest management?

Filed under: Fires, Pines | Tagged: Fire, Forest health, Pine beetles, Shoshone National Forest, Spruce beetle infestation | Leave a comment »

Springtime bloom after the Gunbarrel fire

Posted on June 18, 2009 by Leslie

The burn from last summer

It was interesting to see the burn area from last summer. I wanted to see the new growth and what wildflowers I might find. Burns are important to the west. Many species of trees, shrubs and flowers will only sprout after a burn. Some plant’s seeds can lie dormant for years waiting for the heat of a burn to open them up.

The Gunbarrel fire from last summer was hot and widespread. It burned for months. Here are some wildflowers that I saw yesterday growing out of the scree areas on the hillsides. Native grasses were abundant. Evidence of elk and deer was everywhere. A grizz had recently walked through the unburnt area next to the river.

Many of the wildflowers, some not shown here, were in the pea family. All members of the Pea family (Fabaceae) fix nitrogen in the soil. These kinds of plants and shrubs, like Ceanothus which also fixes nitrogen and comes up after a burn, pave the way and amend the burned soil for successive plants.

I’m still learning my local wildflowers, but lucky for me I’ve found that I can recognize many plants by at least family or Genus based on experience with similar flowers. I haven’t identified all species so feel free to chime in with correct I.D.

Phacelia sericea

Pea family. An astragalus

Pea family-Lupinus argenteus

Penstemon eriantherus with catepillar

Cryptantha Borage family

Unidentified

Mimulus guttatus

Fire and water. The West IS fire.

Filed under: Fires | Tagged: Fire, wildflowers | 7 Comments »

Pheromones, Pine Beetles, and more about fires.

Posted on March 31, 2009 by Leslie

I talked with the Wyoming Dept. of Forestry today. Apparently, the state deals with private landowners, not the forest service. I’m definitely going to go for ordering pheromones for my trees. Paul in the department told me that, yes!, the grizzlies do use the Limber Pine nuts as well as the Pinus albicaulus. He also told me that because of lack of fires, the Limber Pines have become an invasive on rangeland. Of course, I don’t have rangeland. I butt up to a National forest full of Limber Pines from 7000′ all the way up to 8200′ or more.

He said they’ve been doing a lot of management with the North Fork and South Fork, but up till a few years ago, my area was doing okay enough. “Not anymore” we both acknowledged. The south facing slopes across from me are full of beetle kill on the ridge tops. The end of my valley that butts up against the Park is now about 50-70% dead trees. Compare that to the east entrance to the Park (up the North Fork) which is about 90% dead standing timber.

The fires of ’88 came through parts of my valley and through Crandall, which is north of me. In fact, the tiny town of Crandall was almost entirely engulfed and thanks to a major effort, was saved. When you drive by Crandall, you can see where the fires came down almost to the town. Apparently, it was some of the hottest fires. Now the hillsides are regenerating with Aspens. Cathedral Cliffs along Chief Joseph Highway

The point is, those fires near me in ’88 helped form a buffer from the pine beetle which spared my area up till now. But like the economy, those fires of ’88 just ‘kicked the can down the road’, and now my valley’s time is up; due for a big fire.

This winter there’s been logging trucks on my dirt road daily. The biggest private landowner is logging beetle kill around his property for fire protection. The Game & Fish clear-cut a big swath of spruce and fir to make way for aspen growth, and the neighbor to my east is cutting and burning beetle kill weekly. Everyone is aware: its only a matter of time till the fires come this way.

The thing about the blister rust on my trees is that they’ve weakened the pines, along with the many years of drought. Paul said that usually the rust doesn’t kill the trees, especially in the Rockies due to the dryness. And I can see that’s true. These are older pines and surviving despite the brown needles. But then the pine beetle finishes them off.

This is not a spruce or pine beetle but a wood-eating beetle that eats dead wood. They are scary looking though and BIG!

So I have a choice. Spray with Sevin or use the Pheromone packets. The spray lasts for 2 to 3 years. The Pheromones only one. But its a no-brainer for me. I’m just not going to use a non-targeted toxic chemical. Non-targeted in the sense that it kills beetles, and also other insects that could be beneficial; plus the other types of toxicity.

The pheromones simply are a chemical mimic that tell the beetles “This tree is occupied with beetles already. Go find another tree.” If you already have beetles in a tree, neither the chemical nor the pheromones will work.

Paul will come over and look at my property. Its fairly expensive at $7/packet; but its for a good cause. What we discussed is instead of just tagging important trees, I’ll do a grid of packets over my 6 acres. When he comes over, we’ll look at the density and see if I need less than the 30 pkts/acre, which I think I will. May is the target month to put the packets on the trees. The beetles fly in July and August.

Filed under: Fires, Pines | Tagged: Bears, Fire, Limber pine, Pine beetles, Yellowstone National Park | 6 Comments »

When a good fire is a bad fire. Grizzlies and pine nuts

Posted on March 22, 2009 by Leslie

I’ve been working with a small chain saw on the trees around my upper cabin. Most of my 6 acres is on a plateau above the main cabin. That arcreage butts up to Shoshone National Forest. The original owner of my cabin, Doc Firor, deeded that area to Nature Conservancy who gave it to the forest service. That entire plateau extends for several miles and is prime elk habitat. Riddle Flat from across the river. Prime elk habitat

Almost all of the trees up there are Pinus flexilis or Limber Pine. Limber Pine is a white bark pine, which basically means it has bunches of 5 needles. The pine whose common name is Whitebark pine is Pinus albicaulis. That’s the one that everybody is talking about when they say Grizzlies are dependent on the whitebark pine crop. But Limber Pine seeds are just as tasty, and squirrels cache them just the same. Whitebark Limber on left; doug fir on right

Pinus albicaulis and Pinus flexilis are both considered keystone species–that is, without them, an ecosystem can just cascade apart. And both of them are being infected with an imported fungus that is the cause of white pine blister rust. This fungus can kill a tree, and its killing massive amounts of Whitebark Pines in the Pacific Northwest. The Rockies have not been quite as vulnerable because its so much drier here. But with global warming, and the pine beetles, trees that are weakened by the fungus succumb quickly. My one room upper cabin. No water. No plumbing. Yes heat!

I was trying to find out if grizzs will eat Limber Pine nuts as well. That was important to me, because many of my trees have the rust. And I’m trying to find out how to identify correctly the rust, as well as how to treat the trees. Avalanche Peak, Yellowstone. Dead whitebark pines

I went to the National Forest administrative offices last week in Cody. They are all so helpful and nice there. One of the supervisors lent me a new phamphlet and told me there’s a pheromone for the beetles, but nothing for the rust. She said its awfully hard to determine the difference on the tree.

What I really want is a source of blister rust-free seedlings to underplant. The bad news is that whitebarks take 40-50 years to begin to cone. But I can wait. The worse news is that if you can even find a source of seedlings, expect 50% mortality in the first few years. In fact, the booklet has a really complicated formula to determine how many seedlings you need, based on existing site infections and super-overplanting for death. The thing I think would be smart would be to do successive planting over a period of 5-7 years. And since I have a test plot that could be a model for the rest of the nearby forest, I’d love it if the Forest Service used me for testing. Robin at the Ag department told me they do test plots on private land often.

Meanwhile, I’m going on what’s said on the internet and in this phamphlet. I’ve been limbing up by hand and by machine up to 6-8′ from the ground all of my trees (this is a several year project!), starting with around my upper cabin. Since the trees are older, most of the bottom limbs are dead anyways. But limbing up will provide air circulation and light, both will help the trees health. Before pruning; cabin is in the background

Another interesting thing about blister rust is the Ribes (Gooseberry) connection. When the rust first came to this continent, in the 1930’s, they found that Ribes was a host. So the government in their wisdom, decided to eliminate all the Ribes in the West. But there are so many species of Gooseberry native to the West, over 150 in North America. And Ribes is an important food for wildlife. You could never eradicate all the Ribes, and that’s just what they found.

As I was doing all my pruning, sure enough, many many trees have Ribes growing right on top of the trunk. Besides being a host for a nasty disease, I did have to wonder about other types of symbiotic relations between the two, for example nutrient exchange. I haven’t learned about that yet.

Whitebark pines, including my Limber Pine, are an amazing tree. Unlike most pines, they are not wind pollinated, but dependent upon the Clark’s Nutcracker for dispersal. Squirrels too cache the seeds but not as far. They grow on thin soils, at high altitudes, and usually are the first to colonize in disturbed sites, such as fires and landslides. Grizzlies depend on their nutritious content to fatten them up for winter, or satisfy them in the early spring. Grizzlies can’t climb the trees to get the seed. Instead, they are experts at finding squirrel caches and robbing them. When I asked about my Limber Pines, a forester said that grizzlies eat their seeds, but they are rougher so they aren’t number one on the menu. Obviously my plot as well as the forest next to me is just as important for the grizzly recovery.

The benefits of fire in this care are so mixed. Whitebarks are fire-dependent. Where fires have been suppressed, more shade tolerant conifers replace them and there is little opportunity for regeneration. So they like that clear open ground. But their cones don’t open with heat. The seeds are animal dispersed, so there needs to be stands for their new growth, which means they like low- and moderate-intensity fires. That’s hard to have in areas with so much beetle kill and fire suppression like my valley. To add fuel to the fire so to speak, scorch or fire damage on trees that would otherwise live, increases their susceptibility to beetle-kill. After pruning. Cabin is now visible. Deer will love this!

Regardless, I’m thinning away, hoping for more air circulation, light, and in addition all that thinning imitates a ground fire. Many of the natives I would plant in California requires a good chopping back to the ground every so often to mimic fire. That’s what I’m doing for now.

: Avalanche Peak, Yellowstone. Dead whitebark pines

Filed under: Fires, Grizzlies | Tagged: Bears, Fire, Limber pine, Pruning conifers, Shoshone National Forest, Whitebark pines | 1 Comment »

Good fires

Posted on March 21, 2009 by Leslie

If you live in the GYE (Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem), you probably know your trees. You need to, because most people burn wood here for heat. And each type of wood burns different, with more or less heat and more or less ash.

Being a horticulturist, I know my trees. But conifers are hard. I’ve taken three conifer identification courses over the past 20 years. There’s a place near Mt. Shasta in California that, within a one square mile area, there are 22 different varieties of conifers!

Luckily, there aren’t that many conifers out here. In the Park, mostly what you’ll see are Lodgepole pines (Pinus contorta) because they grow on thin soils, which the park has because of all the volcanic activity. Oddly enough, the dominant pine where I lived in California was also Pinus contorta, Shore Pine, but it looks nothing like a lodgepole. Its twisted and shorter. Lodgepoles are called that because they’re nice and straight for using as a teepee shelter, or a lodge. Lodgepole pine Pinus contorta

Last year I was looking at some new Shore Pines around 8 or 9 years old that grew after the Point Reyes fire. They were at least as tall or taller than the Lodgepoles in the Park from the ’88 fires. Same Genus. Same Species. Chalk it up to much more water, esp. in the way of fog. To distinguish the difference, they’ve added another ‘contorta’ at the end. Shore Pine. Pinus contorta

In California, if we want a good slow burning wood, we use Oak of course, a hardwood. But there’s no hardwoods out here, so my friend G___ who was a forester for 20 years, explained some of the differences.

First I went and got a permit to cut wood. There’s plenty of beetle kill up our road towards the park, and every year more and more. We’re doing the forest service a favor by cutting down the dead trees. The main problem as I see it with the beetle kill is that there hasn’t been a good fire here in 100 years. That and global warming as we don’t get the really extended cold temperatures in winter anymore that kill the overwintering eggs. Massive amounts of beetle killed trees at the end of my valley

We went far enough up the road to find some lodgepole. Mostly there’s Engelmann Spruce around my cabin. That doesn’t burn very hot as there’s not much pitch in it. The second best is Douglas Fir (not a real fir. Pseudotsuga menziesii vs. Abies [fir]). The one to get around here is the Lodgepole. I suppose its because there’s lots of pitch. My friend tells me that the old-timers say “Every fifth log, put in an aspen and that will clean your chimney.”

Lodgepoles are fire adapted pines. They keep their cones tightly on the tree. These cones need a really hot day (113 degrees) or a fire to release their seeds. You can age a forest by the diversity of trees. After a fire, of course you’ll have prime grassland as forage for wildlife. Within the first 40-200 years, a dense canopy of lodgepoles develops. As these trees die, or if there are fires, with gaps in the canopy, doug firs and spruces will grow with the increased moisture. In the drier areas new lodgepoles will sprout up.

Last year we had a fire up the North Fork that burned for over a month. That whole area is full of beetle kill pines. As the forest service was closely monitoring it to make sure no structures burned, there was a tremendous amount of controversy over why they weren’t just dowsing it. My neighbor kept saying “They plan to burn up this whole country.” The Cody Enterprise ran critically-toned articles (even though the town was benefitting from the influx of firefighters). Sweetwater lodge after Gunbarrel fire

G___ had a good explanation for the public’s lack of understanding of the necessity for fire in the west. “When your neighbor was born here, for instance, this country had already had natural fires and the landscape showed it. Over time, with fire suppression, the people here came to feel that what they saw was natural. Its not.”

If you live in the West, you better be fire adapted. The West is fire. If you buy in the forest, beware. If you buy up a canyon, beware. The trees, the plants, the animals and their needs are adapted to fire. Water snake after one month in burn area

The Gunbarrel Fire last year was just about to jump over the pass to my valley, when a freak snowstorm happened over labor day. I heard the Forest Service was secretly hoping it would come this way. Not to burn homes, but to help the wildlife. The elk desperately need better quality grass; the beetle killed trees need to burn up; and the soils and animals need those forbs that only sprout after a fire.

I suppose as a botanist/horticulturist, I can’t help but say to myself when I hike in these woods: ‘This place needs a good fire.”