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GhoulweJ
Trad climber
El Dorado Hills, CA
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Aug 28, 2013 - 11:40am PT
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I think about this topic every time I climb at Phantom Spires
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squishy
Mountain climber
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Aug 28, 2013 - 01:18pm PT
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I think about this topic every time I climb at Phantom Spires
Just think of the climbing possibilities being "uncovered" right now near Yosemite..
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atchafalaya
Boulder climber
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Aug 28, 2013 - 02:14pm PT
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What "fuel reduction program" (logging/thinning) occurred in CA prior to the early 1900's?
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Brandon-
climber
The Granite State.
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Aug 28, 2013 - 04:01pm PT
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I'm trying to catch up here. Fires do ravage soils, rendering them useless. Think about the balds in the southern Appalachian mountains.
What exactly are we arguing about?
Ron wants smaller government but increased preventative measures by the USFS?
NIMBYs don't want prescribed burns, but get pissed when their homes burn?
Defensible space?
Wolves are going to invade the spaces that wildfires create?
I'm so confused.
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apogee
climber
Technically expert, safe belayer, can lead if easy
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Aug 28, 2013 - 08:56pm PT
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Brandon's questions are pretty good ones, Ron. I think he was being genuine.
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giegs
climber
Tardistan
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Aug 28, 2013 - 09:43pm PT
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I don't think anyone has mentioned it, but what can be done about the fuel load management in wilderness areas? I've done a bit of thinning work removing hazard trees within falling distance of allotment fencing near Blue, AZ. With a crosscut. No chainsaws, can't have those pesky motors in the woods! Cutting that swath took months and who knows how many man hours, even with us ignoring areas that were too difficult to safely work in. Imagine applying that same approach to fuel-choked wilderness areas for thinning purposes. Never gonna happen.
Even doing selective low-impact thinning with chainsaws and volunteer labor to move logs for extraction and create burn piles is horribly inefficient and really only appropriate for small areas, generally privately owned and funded in part by grants, etc.
Commercial logging isn't all bad. Sometimes, probably often, it's going to be the best tool we have if cuts are closely monitored and discretion is used. I don't know many of the details of the work done off Lake Mary Road outside Flagstaff, but I know it was done quickly, seems to be recovering well, and looks great.
We've got dense fuel loads, beetle kill, dying tamarix stands (a good thing, sort of), access issues, local and national politics, commercial interests, NIMBYs, and who knows what else in play here. I'd love to see a management plan that even attempts to come up with a "solution" that can actually be implemented and keeps interested parties somewhat satisfied with the outcome.
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Dr. Christ
Mountain climber
State of Mine
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Aug 29, 2013 - 01:38am PT
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What "fuel reduction program" (logging/thinning) occurred in CA prior to the early 1900's?
Well, the Washoe used to burn the meadows they had occupied every fall as they left the Lake Tahoe Basin... and just let it burn into the hills. It kept the conifers from encroaching into the meadows (currently a pretty big deal), stimulated the growth of medicinal and culinary plants, and probably looked cool as shit!
Fire ecology is a complicated issue. Many ecosystems have evolved over tens of thousands of years with fire as a key component in the system. Some seeds won't germinate unless they have been burned. The common lodgepole pine is a fire dependent species that "lives to die by fire." Google "fire ecology."
Problems arise when fire is excluded, fuels build up, and sh#t burns much hotter than the organisms have adapted to handle. Seed obliteration, loss of organic matter, soil sterilization, soil hydrophobicity, etc... can all result in irreversible conditions outside the natural range of variability and completely alter the ecosystem.
Natural ecosystems are a mosaic of "subecosystems" scattered across the landscape. The effects of fire are determined by the spatial extent and the burn severity. Saying "fire is good" or "fire is bad" or "fighting fire is good" or "fighting fire is bad" is stoopid.
"Super fires" are just another result of humans fuking with a key ecosystem component... like the loss of top soil in the dust bowl, like anthropogenic climate change, like removing key predators, etc. Just another mess we leave for future generations.
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squishy
Mountain climber
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Aug 29, 2013 - 11:59am PT
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And Squishy.. GFYS What you know about Forestry could be balanced on the point of a dressmakers pin.
Now go away little phat boy. Brandon that goes DOUBLE for you.
While I agree my knowledge of forestry is mostly historical and limited compared to those in the industry, you may be surprised to know I was once very interested in it and I completed the ROP Forestry program in Livermore when I was in school (complete with pot smoke filled bus trips to the Valley). All I truly learned was that it was a field I did not want to enter.
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ontheedgeandscaredtodeath
Social climber
SLO, Ca
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Aug 29, 2013 - 12:14pm PT
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Logged areas will burn like a mofo just like everywhere else, maybe worse in the slash or re-prod. Log if you must, but I call b.s. on the idea it deters fires. I ain't no scientist but I've fought fires in logged areas in every western state that has logging.
I know that small scale stuff can be done that may improve a stand, but that's not really going to solve the big problem (nor is anything else).
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mechrist
Gym climber
South of Heaven
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Aug 29, 2013 - 02:18pm PT
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VERY LITTLE help from our govt.
hahahaaa... the FS isn't the govt? Money to fight those fires wasn't collected from tax payers and funneled through the FS?
There is a huge difference between traditional logging and fuels reduction. HUGE.
You people are ridiculous... just like the Tea Baggers who are ruining this country. Bitch and moan about the problem, yet offer NOTHING in the way of solutions. We have a situation; we need to deal with it.
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