Chains???? Sounds like groundfire. Once its up in the crown things reach kindling temp and
the trees simply explode a couple hundred yards ahead of the line at a time ... at that point it's suicide to fight the fire directly. And this year is going to be really tough with
about 80% of the aging borate bomber fleet grounded for lack of due maintenance.
Actually the fire is not as bad as it sounds. It's a low to moderate intensity fire with minimal crowning. That is, it's burning along the ground, taking out the under brush and not really damaging the large trees. Ponderosa pines are a fire species; they have very thick bark and prefer to have the undergrowth burnt out every now and then. There is also a large amount of green, unburned area with the fire perimeter. Luckily, this area has had frequent fires in the past and the vegetation is not overgrown.Originally Posted by John Kasaian
And to confuse the issue about chains, there are two types of chains, an engineering chain which is 100 ft long and a forestry chain which is 66 feet long.
I only have just 2 acres and keep the front .75, where the structures are, mown fairly well. When the vegetation dies I get have that crap mown down on the entire lot. There are some vacant lots here-and-there but, for the most part, they're lived on and fairly well cared for. I very much miss my property in Alto, NM (I sold it) but I don't miss worrying about those tall pines going up in a blaze.
I never heard the term "chains" used with reference to fires, even back before the pro fire
crews when they'd hire we hill kids to fight the fires. I never heard either Forest Service
people use the term of Smokey the Bear himself. But I haven't spoken to Smokey in many
many years. ... last I heard, he's still doing time in Folsom Prison for arson.
Just an up-date. the Whitewater fire is pushing 260,000 acres or 415 square miles and Bear Springs fire at 190 acres. The Bear Springs fire is starting too endanger some Native cultural sites which is not a good thing. This is much the same as the Conchas fire of last year, and summer has not even started yet.
Jan Pietrzak
Depending on wind direction we are getting quite a bit of smoke from the NM fires. I was traveling down the San Luis Valley a couple of Thursdays ago and it was difficult to make out the mountains on either side. It was also smoky in our neighborhood.
Then, fourteen miles to the northwest of here is the Little Sand fire in the Wenimuche. It has been burning for 10 days or so. A couple of days ago it was deemed under control so the Hot Shot teams left, leaving the locals in charge. Last night it jumped the fire lines and as of early this morning it has burned another 5000 acres.
We have had little rain over the past three weeks. I am afraid it will be a long, smoky summer.
al
Spelling correction: It is Weminuche!
al
This may present an opportunity for people to do a long term photo study of the regrowth after the fires. Are there any interesting locations where one could set a location pin and return on a regular basis to document the changes?
Thanks.
Ric
These kinds of studies are done all kinds of places. A lot has to do with just how hot the
ground got scorched. Fire is (or was) a relatively normal part of the ecosystem, but we've
managed to turn them into something catastropic. In many areas, including here, the
native Americans managed groundcover for millenia thru the use of fire. It keep meadows
open to attract deer etc. Then lightning fires would cull out beetle infestations and ground cover but spare healthy trees. I don't want to go into detail, but I've done a certain amt
of study about this myself. Now I'm content to phtograph it, or try crawling thru all the
new growth to get from Point A to B. After the catastropic Pt Reyes fire of about a decade ago, for every old pitchy bisop pine that burned, fifty new ones sprouted up. Only
the winners which grow fastest and monopolize the light will survive. In the interim all the
fireweed and thimbleberries etc were quite impressive. A number of homes at the edge of
the park burned too, but all this could have been prevented if it weren't for decades of
artificial fire supression. As for controls burns, they get away sometimes too.
I cut down all but the very smallest of trees near my buildings. I keep the vegetation fairly well mown during green season and mow it short if dry. There's very little chance of my structures going up in flames. Next is to add some sort of stone border around the perimeters of the buildings to keep even small grass fires away from them.
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