[pct-l] Burned area recovery

[Richard Woods]

Well, right in some cases.
If there is not much of a fuel load around the tree, then a grass or  
brush fire just 'takes out the trash' so to speak, passing through  
quickly without heating the tree and the ground too deeply. Plants  
and critters can survive underground or by getting out of the way.
You'll see blackened tree trunks for a few years, but most of the  
burn scars will disappear within a year or two. The up side is the  
incredible flowers the following spring, and the speed with which the  
ecology springs back to life with all the added nutrients suddenly  
returned to the soil.
But.
Here comes the big qualification.
When fire does NOT take out the trash often enough (chance or fire  
suppression) the fuel load gets heavy enough to create a really hot,  
intense fire, such as crown fires in heavy timber. That type of fire  
is death to a forest for decades to come. That is the kind of fire  
that sterilizes the ground and kills the root systems of conifers  
which are generally shallowly rooted.  Everything burns. Every seed,  
every critter, every root, even the soil bacteria.
A classic example is the burn area just south of Reds Meadow. You  
pass through an area of black tree trunks for about a mile. That fire  
burned decades ago, and the area is only now being repopulated by  
brush and grasses. There is almost no vegetable matter in the soil,  
except what has blown in from the outside. Therefore, no soil  
bacteria, nothing to hold moisture in, no way for a normal forest  
ecology to survive except in little spots where enough decaying plant  
material has gathered in one spot to support a mini-oasis in that  
moonscape.

I don't feel bad about natural fires passing through, no matter how  
much it disrupts my personal plans. If I plan to be in an area when a  
fire is passing through, that's just the luck of the draw. We should  
get nervous when a fire doesn't pass through an area every decade or so.
Rick

On Aug 15, 2006, at 10:00 AM, pct-l-request at backcountry.net wrote:


Christine is right. There was a fire in 1910 on Mount Si in WA. The  
bark is
still shows evident's of the fire on one side. That's almost 100   
years. Of
course we have tougher hides up here in the great North West.

Lonetrail

Mike,Don't worry too much about the oaks.  Most of 'em will  survive the
fire, and
in five years, you won't be able to tell (at least  from the oaks)  
that a
fire had passed through.  It *will* look like a  moonscape for a  
while, but
oaks have a remarkable capability to sprout new  shoots from many  
dormant
nodes along their branches post-fire.     The bark is burned, but the  
cambium
layer - the living part of the trunk  and branches - is still alive  
inside,
where it counts.