I live in California and totally agree. Today’s fires are burning so hot that they’re even killing giant sequoias that have survived hundreds or thousands of years. Beetles are destroying many other old growth trees in the Sierras and beyond (https://www.redding.com/story/news/2021/07/06/drought-bark-beetle-wildfire-risk-california-forests/7879061002). After fires, even smaller ones, non-native, fast growing invasive grasses take root in burned areas which makes them more susceptible to future fires. It’s awful.
Sorry for the delayed response! One key issue that seems to have eluded many government managers or green special interests is that forests will continue to age and die, even if you say they're "protected." Too many have bought into the notion that because you call something "old growth," it will exist unchanged for several centuries or even millennia.
While some tree species can survive for that long, many become overmature and decadent in far less time. Active forest management can consider the ecology of the tree species and remove some older trees to account for disease, pest infestations, etc. At the same time, it can remove (or manage the levels of) the fuel loading—smaller trees, shrubs, and grasses.
Until some forest managers and a LOT of greens can understand that putting a fence around a piece of forested land and calling it "protected" doesn't preserve it in perpetuity, we'll continue to see these areas decimated by disease, pests, and fire.
I appreciate the mini forestry lesson. Also note we can’t even blame crazy California policies for all the problems here, because a lot of the lands here are under federal control.
California's leftist/Democrat congress critters have a significant influence on how policies are set on federal lands such as those "managed" by the US Forest Service. That is especially the case when there is a Democrat President, so it will be interesting to see what happens under Trump v2. There is currently a $700 million budget [EDIT: deficit] for USFS, and many non-fire fighter jobs will be cut in 2025, and services cut.
I'm astonished that the quasi-monopoly PG&E (CPUC: run by corrupt Democrats/leftists?) hasn't been broken up, and is still sending $billions in profit to Wall Street instead of investing it in better energy infrastructure in California. Some of the big wildfires in California were caused by PG&E not being able, or willing to, cut trees far enough back from powerline right-of-ways, and then the trees fell into powerlines during high wind events, causing sparking and fires.
The model for local public utility districts is well established (water, sewage, garbage, electricity). It just needs to be extended to a regional level to facilitate the break up of PG&E.
Indeed, PG&E has focused on spending billions to build solar instead of maintaining its aging distribution and transmission infrastructure.
Also, I have written other pieces about how California's wildfire management mistakes are a warning to the rest of the nation. The issue is primarily forest management and fuel loading, not climate change.
Chico, California based Zeke Lunder, senior wildfire analyst and mapping specialist, has a blog* that has lots of good, practical information on wildfire ecology and policy criticism. He is kind of leftish and environmentalist, but is also skeptical of the current system based on close experience with govt agencies for decades. He recently called for the decentralization of management of federal lands and a return to local control due to pervasive, long standing bureaucratic stasis and lack of innovation. (He almost sounds anarcho-libertarian.) He did a detailed youtube video about the large Almanor bioenergy plant that used thinned trees and slash to generate electricity (with corporate welfare from the state). "Environmentalists" that (mindlessly) favored smaller biogeneration plants (which have no economic justification) lobbied for the curtailment of the large, legacy plant, which then shut down large scale tree thinning operations. Some of those thinning operations were on large, private timberlands.
The areas that went unthinned were of the hardest hit by recent catastrophic wildfires.
Lunder is an active participant in local prescribed burn groups (mostly volunteer), including Native tribes in the north coast ranges.
I live in California and totally agree. Today’s fires are burning so hot that they’re even killing giant sequoias that have survived hundreds or thousands of years. Beetles are destroying many other old growth trees in the Sierras and beyond (https://www.redding.com/story/news/2021/07/06/drought-bark-beetle-wildfire-risk-california-forests/7879061002). After fires, even smaller ones, non-native, fast growing invasive grasses take root in burned areas which makes them more susceptible to future fires. It’s awful.
Sorry for the delayed response! One key issue that seems to have eluded many government managers or green special interests is that forests will continue to age and die, even if you say they're "protected." Too many have bought into the notion that because you call something "old growth," it will exist unchanged for several centuries or even millennia.
While some tree species can survive for that long, many become overmature and decadent in far less time. Active forest management can consider the ecology of the tree species and remove some older trees to account for disease, pest infestations, etc. At the same time, it can remove (or manage the levels of) the fuel loading—smaller trees, shrubs, and grasses.
Until some forest managers and a LOT of greens can understand that putting a fence around a piece of forested land and calling it "protected" doesn't preserve it in perpetuity, we'll continue to see these areas decimated by disease, pests, and fire.
I appreciate the mini forestry lesson. Also note we can’t even blame crazy California policies for all the problems here, because a lot of the lands here are under federal control.
California's leftist/Democrat congress critters have a significant influence on how policies are set on federal lands such as those "managed" by the US Forest Service. That is especially the case when there is a Democrat President, so it will be interesting to see what happens under Trump v2. There is currently a $700 million budget [EDIT: deficit] for USFS, and many non-fire fighter jobs will be cut in 2025, and services cut.
correction: USFS budget deficit
I'm astonished that the quasi-monopoly PG&E (CPUC: run by corrupt Democrats/leftists?) hasn't been broken up, and is still sending $billions in profit to Wall Street instead of investing it in better energy infrastructure in California. Some of the big wildfires in California were caused by PG&E not being able, or willing to, cut trees far enough back from powerline right-of-ways, and then the trees fell into powerlines during high wind events, causing sparking and fires.
The model for local public utility districts is well established (water, sewage, garbage, electricity). It just needs to be extended to a regional level to facilitate the break up of PG&E.
Indeed, PG&E has focused on spending billions to build solar instead of maintaining its aging distribution and transmission infrastructure.
Also, I have written other pieces about how California's wildfire management mistakes are a warning to the rest of the nation. The issue is primarily forest management and fuel loading, not climate change.
https://www.mackinac.org/forest-management-is-more-effective-than-climate-virtue-signaling
Yes, you are correct. For many leftists climate change and wokeism is a quasi-religious cult. They are lost in an echo chamber.
Chico, California based Zeke Lunder, senior wildfire analyst and mapping specialist, has a blog* that has lots of good, practical information on wildfire ecology and policy criticism. He is kind of leftish and environmentalist, but is also skeptical of the current system based on close experience with govt agencies for decades. He recently called for the decentralization of management of federal lands and a return to local control due to pervasive, long standing bureaucratic stasis and lack of innovation. (He almost sounds anarcho-libertarian.) He did a detailed youtube video about the large Almanor bioenergy plant that used thinned trees and slash to generate electricity (with corporate welfare from the state). "Environmentalists" that (mindlessly) favored smaller biogeneration plants (which have no economic justification) lobbied for the curtailment of the large, legacy plant, which then shut down large scale tree thinning operations. Some of those thinning operations were on large, private timberlands.
The areas that went unthinned were of the hardest hit by recent catastrophic wildfires.
Lunder is an active participant in local prescribed burn groups (mostly volunteer), including Native tribes in the north coast ranges.
* https://the-lookout.org/
Thanks. I'll take a look.
There are a few federal forest managers that seem to 'get it' on the issue of active management and prescribed burns. I wrote about them in my John Locke Foundation report, "First in Forestry." https://www.johnlocke.org/research/north-carolina-first-in-forestry/
Good one.
Thanks, Al.