Prescribed Fires in Wilderness Areas

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raven
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Prescribed Fires in Wilderness Areas

Post by raven » September 21st, 2014, 10:42 pm

mcds was kind enough to provide a link to a Willamette NF document describing planned uses of fire to remove downed fuels in Wilderness Areas:
http://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOC ... 384816.pdf
The documents specifically state that the burns provide the USFS with the right to use chain saws in the Wilderness -- and not for trail maintenance. Nothing is said in the documents about rebuilding trails damaged, nor is it clear that funds have been budgeted for fire-related trail work.

The burn plans slipped past my radar and the radar of an academic forest ecologist I know. He normally keeps abreast of these matters. Apparently the "test" plots were chosen for other than general research purposes, since there is no sign in the documents that academic (independent) ecologists were asked if they might want to study the impacts. I am not sure there were hearings -- the planning seems to have been rather stealthy. The first burn may be this month or next.

One of the two initial sites is obviously designed to protect the Mt Bachelor Ski Area. The burn is intended to include the timber to the top of the main climbing route on the South Sister, all the routes to Green Lakes from the south, and the area south of and southwest of Broken Top. (Crown fires are expected over parts of the areas, so some trees will die.) The burn area map is here: http://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOC ... 384814.pdf

It is as though the first uses of the technique were designed to affect as many Three Sisters Wilderness users as possible: Sparks Lake on the south end and the Frog Camp area on the north end (Scott Butte). One paragraph in the documents is to me quite alarming , particularly in the absence of academic observers comparing plans with results:
Due the size of the project, and the remote, limited access to the areas, fuels specialists propose to use helicopters equipped with Aerial Sphere Dispensers (ping-pong balls) or a heli-torch to accomplish prescribed fire ignitions.


The proactive fire project's page is: http://www.fs.usda.gov/detail/willamett ... rdb5383417 When you read the reasons given for the project, protecting wilderness values is obviously a tacked on afterthought. The burns are intended to protect resources outside the WA so Wildernesses can be allowed to burn unchecked.

I do not believe that the criteria for WA modification should be non-WA values. What's your opinion, pro or con?

About the South Sister climbing route/ Green Lakes/ Broken Top as an initial burn area/learning device as opposed to a more compact less intrusive site: what are your thoughts?

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Koda
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Re: Prescribed Fires in Wilderness Areas

Post by Koda » September 22nd, 2014, 7:51 am

raven wrote:I do not believe that the criteria for WA modification should be non-WA values. What's your opinion, pro or con?
I need to learn more but on the surface I would support this, Wilderness Areas are contained areas so some form of WA management should be considered including how the WA affects its neighbors. Like the homes across the hwy. Its one thing to say let the WA burn if it starts naturally, but a WA is not a boundary designed by nature....
raven wrote:About the South Sister climbing route/ Green Lakes/ Broken Top as an initial burn area/learning device as opposed to a more compact less intrusive site: what are your thoughts?
I don't see a reason to discriminate one area to the next eventually they all need fuel reduction. Its really a matter of if it should be allowed at all.
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retired jerry
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Re: Prescribed Fires in Wilderness Areas

Post by retired jerry » September 22nd, 2014, 7:59 am

Makes sense to experiment with less used areas first. Maybe figure out the best way to do it with minimum negative impact.

Seems like the East side of the Cascades is more prone to burning so maybe that should be first.

Walking through burned areas on Sisters and Hood, it wasn't a big deal. After a couple years it's green again.

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drm
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Re: Prescribed Fires in Wilderness Areas

Post by drm » September 22nd, 2014, 8:43 am

Based on Raven's description (I do not ave the time to read the docs myself now), I would not support this. Skiing and other developed areas next to wilderness should not drive what is allowed or done within the wilderness.

I'm not sure about prescribed burns in wilderness anyway, but I wouldn't rule it out if past suppression has created an untenable buildup of fuel.

I would add that in many parts of the country, ski area permit applications - whether to create one or add to it in some way - does not allow much consideration of impacts on contiguous land. When I lived in Colorado this was a constant bone of contention, that obvious broader negative impacts could not be considered because permit evaluation regulations what could be considered.

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retired jerry
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Re: Prescribed Fires in Wilderness Areas

Post by retired jerry » September 22nd, 2014, 8:53 am

As I was walking through Mt Hood Meadows on Timberline trail, there were people with chainsaws cutting small trees and brush to keep ski runs clear.

Probably easier and cheaper for them to use fire.

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Koda
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Re: Prescribed Fires in Wilderness Areas

Post by Koda » September 22nd, 2014, 9:10 am

drm wrote:Based on Raven's description (I do not ave the time to read the docs myself now), I would not support this. Skiing and other developed areas next to wilderness should not drive what is allowed or done within the wilderness.
What about homes and residences? What about entire towns like Govt Camp, Bend or Sisters?
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drm
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Re: Prescribed Fires in Wilderness Areas

Post by drm » September 22nd, 2014, 10:34 am

Koda wrote:
drm wrote:Based on Raven's description (I do not ave the time to read the docs myself now), I would not support this. Skiing and other developed areas next to wilderness should not drive what is allowed or done within the wilderness.
What about homes and residences? What about entire towns like Govt Camp, Bend or Sisters?
While as I said I'm not completely opposed to prescribed burns in wilderness, people who choose to build and live next to them up in the mountains are choosing that risk, so that does not get an easy by. I say this as somebody who recreates in wilderness but prefers to live in town.

mcds
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Re: Prescribed Fires in Wilderness Areas

Post by mcds » September 22nd, 2014, 10:55 am

Koda wrote: What about homes and residences? What about entire towns like Govt Camp, Bend or Sisters?
Are you saying that Bend and Sisters are threatened by wildfires in the Three Sisters Wilderness Area or some other wilderness area?

Image

mcds
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Re: Prescribed Fires in Wilderness Areas

Post by mcds » September 22nd, 2014, 11:14 am

I have not been following the project, but I did read the Briefing Paper (see link by raven in the top post). When I first came across it a couple weeks ago, the idea was so ludicrous (to me) that I thought for sure it was some 'pie in sky' idea dreamed up as an exercise in outrageousness. I was surprised to read in the original post that it is imminent.

Overall, 13 focus areas were identified. Here is an example:
Image

This is the area that they propose to intentionally burn:

Image

They did not depict the hiking trails within the area they plan to burn.

The plan is to burn 42% (of that wilderness acreage) in patches ranging from '10s to 100-200 acres' (page 14 and 15). According to the Briefing Paper, the forest composition in that area is such that it will "burn with high severity and include visible amounts of crown scorch and tree mortality" (page 14).

Before they start burning that forest, they will carry out fuels-reduction on the non-wilderness land bordering the wilderness burn area: "Treatments outside the wilderness would include small diameter tree thinning, hand pile construction, tree pruning and prescribed fire treatments", and "These treatments would provide an essential defensible area to lower the risk of prescribed fires escaping, as well as providing a containment area for future wildfires that threatened to cross wilderness boundaries." (both page 14)

EDIT:
Here are two more maps at roughly the same scale as the one immediately above that depicts area-to-be-burned.

Image

Image
Last edited by mcds on September 22nd, 2014, 11:56 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Koda
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Re: Prescribed Fires in Wilderness Areas

Post by Koda » September 22nd, 2014, 11:50 am

drm wrote:
Koda wrote:
drm wrote:Based on Raven's description (I do not ave the time to read the docs myself now), I would not support this. Skiing and other developed areas next to wilderness should not drive what is allowed or done within the wilderness.
What about homes and residences? What about entire towns like Govt Camp, Bend or Sisters?
While as I said I'm not completely opposed to prescribed burns in wilderness, people who choose to build and live next to them up in the mountains are choosing that risk, so that does not get an easy by. I say this as somebody who recreates in wilderness but prefers to live in town.
I agree they are choosing that risk, I just think that a residence should have some consideration. I tend to be more sympathetic towards homeowners than businesses (such as ski areas). Like I mentioned earlier the WA boundary is not a natural feature so on some level a prescribed burn should be considered to protect residences.

mcds wrote:
Koda wrote: What about homes and residences? What about entire towns like Govt Camp, Bend or Sisters?
Are you saying that Bend and Sisters are threatened by wildfires in the Three Sisters Wilderness Area or some other wilderness area?
yes. I don't see any reason a fire started in the adjacent wilderness areas couldn't reach those towns. Black Butte Ranch would be another example.

The purpose of the program is

The fact that we had to create designated areas to preserve nature doesn't make their boundaries natural, it seems logical that they be managed. I also don't see anything wrong with protecting infrastructure and natural resources adjacent to the WA's. If there is an excessive amount of fuel in the WA's its because of recently humans fighting fires. And if there is an un-natural amount of fuel in the wilderness areas then it needs human intervention to maintain its natural condition. Hundreds of years ago, natural fires were never this devastating because the fuels were regularly burned by nature, wilderness areas back then didn't exist they were technically the entire continent... It doesn't make sense to treat these technically small man made "designated" areas the same as it was hundreds of years ago because its not the same anymore.
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