California Rim Fire is getting BIG!

[Chris .]

Almost to a man, those who I have met or observed who claimed to be wonderful stewards of the environments are the worst litterbugs and deviants. While those are the most scorned as destroyers of the planet are usually the best stewards of it. Witness Surprise Canyon in Ca being destroyed by "hikers" or the trash from the CBD being cited for littering willfully right in front of a ranger.

[Jerry Adams]

"Root cause of drought is a huge debate that no one can prove at this point in time."

+1

[Desert Dweller]

I get real tired of people making blanket statements about grazing and ranching when they have no real life experience living it. Its insulting. My family ranched in California since the 1880s and did not over graze. Overgrazing is stupid cause there has to be good grass for the next years and the coming generations. Ranchers recognize that erosion and plant destruction hurts everyone. All good ranchers knew this and the practice was to rotate cattle and livestock into different areas to insure graze for both wildlife and cattle. And we worked darn hard doing it. It serves no purpose to overgraze for the current rancher and the future ones. Ranchers were the first managers of our lands and the forest service and government agencies came way afterwards. Apparently the few "bad" ranchers reputations is all people know about. A little history from Arizona…When the biggest and richest rancher in the world, Henry Hooker who had the largest and finest herds here in Arizona north of Wilcox, saw that an impending series of droughts were drying up what formerly was the best graze land in the world, he sold off and dispersed his herds and left. He was a smart business man and saw the climate changing. He was not an over grazing idiot, he knew if the land could not replenish itself then he would be shortly out if business. Rather than decimate the land he sold out.
I would like to think that somewhere now there are people willing to listen to the truth about our ranching history and their good stewardship of our lands, not all ranchers decimated every piece of land they grazed on!

[Dan @ Durston Gear]

Climate Change
"Climate change is a bunch of horse poop. Natural fires have happened since the beginning of recorded history."
I don't think climate change scientists are arguing forest fires never existed until recently. Even if you think that humans have nothing to do with the rapid rate of climate warming (warm periods have happened historically, but warming this fast isn't normal and species won't be able to adapt quick enough), you can't argue we aren't putting out a ton of C02. Even if C02 has nothing to do with the warming, a full 25% of C02 gets absorbed by the ocean (cold hard fact) which creates carbonic acid (cold hard fact) which is what is causing ocean acidification (cold hard fact). This is a current and impending crises for the earth's oceans as it is killing off coral reefs, preventing mollusks and shellfish from crafting shells etc. So even if climate change is horse poop, we still need to stop emitting C02 or we're dealing with large scale ecological problems which are going adversely affect humanity. Be a part of the solution.

Livestock
I've probably read too much Dave Foreman and Ed Abbey to really have a fair and balanced view anymore. My earlier comments on grazing were broad, but I was referring to large scale/quasi-corporate grazing on public lands, not private ranches etc.

Livestock grazing can be done well when the ranchers have a genuine interest in preserving the land – which is often the case as you mention either through private ownership or shared use of public land by a small group of ranchers. The problematic side of grazing is when you get too many parties sharing public lands, which can lead to a "tragedy of the commons" situation where backing off and being responsible just opens the door for someone else to exploit the land.

Pine Beetles
The forest fire/climate change/pine beetle situation is complex. What we do know is that temperature has a huge effect on juvenille survival of pine beetles (Bentz and Bracewell, 2011). So as things heat up even 0.5-1 degree we get (1) highly increased over winter survival of pine beetle juveniles and (2) expanding distributions of pine beetles as they move their range further north. So climate change contributes to forest fires both directly (hotter, drier) and indirectly (increased fuel via pine beetles).

[USA Duane Hall]

Well expressed Dan.
Where I live here in N CA., the FS got stalled a few times in their effort to make communities a little fire resistant, by going in and thinning small trees and piling down trees where able around us, then in the Fall, burning the piles. Some environmental groups filed in courts to stop this, all it did was delay the work and cost tax payers money. We'll see if the work pays off.
Duane

[steven franchuk]

"I thought the forest service encouraged fires to burn often to prevent these mega fires from happening."

Most national parks allow naturally caused fires to burn or implement controlled burns to keep the parks in a naturally place. This has been the yosemite policy since about 1970.

However in national forests it is typically unusual for the forest service to allow fires to burn. For the past 100 years forest fires were put out. Today national forests are starting to do controlled burns to try and restore the natural state of the forest. This has to be done very carefully due to the fuel load that has built up over the last 100 years. A few years ago a controlled burn north of highway 140 near yosemite valley got out of control and it took about a week to get it under control.

From Glacier point in august it is not unusual to see some smoke from small forest fires. Most of these fires are small and slowly burn along the forest floor. Very seldom do the naturally occurring fires burn entire trees.

The current fire started in a area with a lot dead wood on the the forest floor. That fuel created a large fire that reached the crowns of the trees which then burst into flames. Crown fires were very rare 150 years ago. Today they have become common while the slow forest floor fires have become rare.

"Isnt this the same general area that burned in 1987?"

I don't think so. I believe the 1987 fire burn mostly south of Highway 120 almost up to the east end of Yosemite valley. The current fire is mostly north of Highway 120 between the town of Groveland and Hetch Hetchy valley. Most of the trees burning in the current fire are quite large indicating that there has not be a big fire in the area for over 50 years.

"Now, since there are less cattle, sheep and goats grazing on public land the forest under stories have grown unimpeded for about a decade or more"

In a mature conifer forest grass doesn't grow on the forest floor and very few shrubs are pressent. There generally isn't enough light reaching the forest floor for grass and shurbs.

Historically (50 to 100 years ago) all the grazing activity in the area was in Hetch hetchy valley, yosemite valley and Tuolumne valley, buck medows and other naturally tree free areas. These were the only areas that had enough grass to support grazing animals. These areas either had too much snow or a very high water table that prevented fir forests from developing. The area burning now was never a major grazing area.

[Bob Gross]

"I believe the 1987 fire burn mostly south of Highway 120 almost up to the east end of Yosemite valley."

This is totally incorrect.

–B.G.–

[Jeremy and Angela]

I believe this may cover the fire history:

https://sites.google.com/site/pyrogeography/Home/rim_firehist3.jpg

[Jerry Adams]

Interesting map

It looks like most of the surrounding area has burned since 1950

Inside the Rim fire boundary, most of the area has burned since 1987

This is inconsistent with the idea that fire supression is the problem

[Mike Oxford]

Lost our cabin in the fire relatively early on, just outside of Groveland. Serious bummer … built by my great-grandfather back in the 40s.

Last count I heard was 111 structures.

-mox

[Greg Mihalik]

"This is inconsistent with the idea that fire supression is the problem"

What is the inconsistency?

[USA Duane Hall]

Sorry to hear that Mike. I met the Ross family next to MTR a few years ago, by Florence Lake. Neat history.
Duane

[spelt with a t]

When the biggest and richest rancher in the world, Henry Hooker who had the largest and finest herds here in Arizona north of Wilcox, saw that an impending series of droughts were drying up what formerly was the best graze land in the world, he sold off and dispersed his herds and left. He was a smart business man and saw the climate changing. He was not an over grazing idiot, he knew if the land could not replenish itself then he would be shortly out if business. Rather than decimate the land he sold out.

Instead of scaling back operations to what the land could sustain, he sold out and left? That is not stewardship, that is turning your back and walking away. To steward means to care for. Obviously he did not care for the land as much as for his money.

[steven franchuk]

Sorry to hear about your cabin.

Today I hear on the new that they identified the cause of the fire. Apparently a hunter light a campfire and it gout out of control. they apparently know his name but have not released thaat. No word yet on what fines or penalties he faces.

[Jerry Adams]

"Interesting map

It looks like most of the surrounding area has burned since 1950

Inside the Rim fire boundary, most of the area has burned since 1987

This is inconsistent with the idea that fire supression is the problem

What is the inconsistency?"

Most of the area inside the Rim Fire area has burned since 1987.

The theory is, that since we supress fires, the current fires are worse, but since they all burned since 1987, this isn't correct.

Maybe even though the map says they burned since 1987, the fires only burned a little bit or something, so it's not clear. That's why I said "it's inconsistent".

Now, if the last time the area burned was before 1947 when the Smokey The Bear campaign started and we started supressing fires more vigorously, then that would be consistent with the theory that fire supression causes worse fires.

[Author]

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