We are fired up about burning for healthy forests!

Burn Season

November 8th, 2010 Filed Under Blog

Do you think the burning season begins in late February? Think a gain. Tomorrow with its 69F 25% RH, fine dead fuel moisture of 9% unshaded and 10% shaded should work pretty good in many fuel beds in central Alabama. The KBDI in Central Alabama is in the mid-500s. The burn alert has been lifted due to recent rains. A lot of good understory burning can be done tomorrow. If you need help give me a call.

Drought

October 21st, 2010 Filed Under Blog

In Alabama the drought persists. We had a trace of rain this morning, 1o/20/2010, but not enough to facilitate any burning. The KBDI in the area, as well as most of the state, remains above 700. A review of todays burn permits on the AFC web site indicates a few burns were permitted. Apparently there were two wildlife reported in north Alabama. These are the times that try burn managers patience. Patience is a virtue for wise burners. There is always the tendency to focus on getting that site prep burn done becasuse the herbicide has been applied and planting season is coming on. BUT, be WISE, minimize risk. Keep the match in the pocket and the torch in the truck until conditions are more favorable. It is much cheaper to miss a burning/planting window than it is to pay for damages of an excaped burn.

Integrated Forest and Wildlife Management and prescribed burning

October 16th, 2010 Filed Under Blog

This past week I had the good fortune to participate in the Integrated Forest and Wilife Managemetn for the Private Forest Owner meeting. It was sponsored by the Alabama Cooperative Extension System, The Auburn University School of Forestry and Wildife Sciences and the Alabama Wildlife Federation. It was held at the Natural Resources Educatiuon Cneter in Camden, Alabama. Dr. Mark Smith did a great job of organizing and facilitating the program. What made it so special to me was the cooperation between foresters and wildlife biologists. For most of my career there has been a sever schism between foresters and biologist. I don’t know how it got started. It predates me. Biologist would proably say it stemmed form expansive clear cutting by foret a mangers. Foresters might say it stemmed from a lack of understanding of the economics of land ownership on the part of biologist. That doesn’t really matter. what is impostant is that the two disciplines seem to unerstand that in alrge part we are working with the same resource and have many common intersts. What brought this about? It could have been the biologist realization of the utility of herbicides of timber harvesting for habitat management. Foresters realized that critters are a part of the forest as well as the trees. But one thing that was very apparent in the Integrated Management meeting was that prescribe fire is probably the most important tool for manipulating a forest be it for trees or for critters.

Hats off to Dr Mark Smith. This is the best thing I have seen come out of Forestry and Wildlife Extension in years. Keep up the good work Mark.

If we can integrate forest and wildlife managemtn can we take it to the land scape level and have a real impact on animal populations. HTe disected pattern of land ownership in Alabama today make it very difficult if not impossible for many forest land owners to do anything positive for quail, wild turkeys and deer. These three critters may be the source of the biggest recreational economic engine avialable to land owenrs today. A person who ownes forty acres may manicure his ownership into ideal quail habitat but becuase of the limited area his efforts will have little potential for quali population development. However, if numerous alndowners in a area work together toward a common objective they can have an impact. I think of this concept as LANDSCAPE MANAGEMENT. Maybe the route to this goal would be strengthening the county forestry palnning committees. In some counties there are Treasure Forest Landowner Associations. These two groups in some cases work at odds with one another. That is ridiculous but that is the topic of another blog. Agencies, USDA NRCS, AFC, DCNR Wildlife, NGOSs – TNC, Alabama Wildlife Federation, The Wild Turkey Association, the quail group, the deer maangemetn group, QDM, all could place an emphasis on neighbor cooperation and land scape maangemnt concepts. Rob Holbrook, East Gulf Coastal Plain Joint Venture, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 1208-B Main Street
Daphne, AL 36526, (251) 441-5830, is interested in providing assitance to develop new prescribed fire cooperatives. This might be a beginning point? Neighbor helping neighbor sharing equipment, talent, and labor. If the county planning committees would take this type of integrated cooperation on htay could have a significant impact.

Anyone interested in pursueing the concept of land scape management and nenighbor helping neighbor cooperative please feel free to let me or Rob know. If you have ideas please share them.

Alabama Certified Burn Manager Training Opportunity

March 24th, 2010 Filed Under Blog

Who should attend? Anyone interested in using prescribed fire under the Alabama Right to Burn Law to manager natural resources, foresters, wildlife biologist, farmers, contractors, land owners, particularly individuals needing Certified Burn Manager continuing education credit required every five years to maintain CBM Certification by the Alabama Forestry Commission.

Wehle Recert Flyer

NWCG compliance ???

February 5th, 2010 Filed Under Blog

Should all prescribed burn managers be NWCG compliant? As a seventy-two year old burner I have a bias. NO NO NO !!! I can’t pass the physical endurance test. But I still burn regularly and “knock on wood” without incident. Do I use good technique that conform to most NWCG prescribed burning principles? Yes.
I am like many of the land owners and contract burner in the State of Alabama and across the south. In Alabama there are some 275,000 private land owners. They own 90+% of Alabama’s forest land. There are not enough agency of NGO burners to do the burning that needs to be done. Should the private sector burner be required to be NWCG compliant? I don’t think so. Many of them have been burning effectively, efficiently, without incident for many years. Why constrain them to a standard that while effective for many organizations is not necessarily effective or efficient for them.
Certified burn managers or for that matter any wildland burner should be trained in fire weather, fuels, fire behavior, smoke management, smoke screening, fire effects, and prescribed fire planning. They should adhere to basic principles. Can they learn those principles other than under NWCG standards? YES
Think about it. In the past how many prescribed burn “screw ups” have occurred at the hands of a “Red Carded” NWCG compliant practitioner. Are NWCG compliant burners immune to “stepping on their poncho”? Who did the Cerro Grandee burn? Who did the I4 burn in Florida? Who did the east Georgia burn that smoked in Atlanta a year or so ago. I don’t think NWCG compliant burners screw up more frequently than non NWCG compliant private land owners and independent contractors. Do you?
Should an individual be NWCG compliant to obtain a burn permit? NO, and until there is evidence that NWCG compliant burners are immune to screwing up they never should.
NWCG compliance is essential for large organizations that cooperate with one another on the fire scene. NWCG compliance has it place but not as a requirement for private land owners and independent burning contractors.
That is my opinion and I am sticking to it.
What say you?

High intensity wildland fire ???

February 5th, 2010 Filed Under Blog

See the article under lessons on this site….New Report Debunks Myth of “Catastrophic Wildfire”. What is in a name? What is in a word? High intensity burn, catastrophis wildfire, stand replacing burn? A rose is still a rose under any other name. However, what we call things does impact public opinion. The author of the article makes a good point.

Could we think of high intensity burn in relation to a stand of trees as being a “serotinous” ecosystem? The stand or ecosystems requires high intensity fire to regenerate itself. Thus from the standpoint of the ecosystem a high intensity burn is a healty, cleansing, rejuvinating event. For the individual tree a high intensity burn is dramatic.

Safety, prescribed fire, NOMEX

January 20th, 2010 Filed Under Blog

A frind of mine was burning the other day, By bimself!! That is not good. Too many things can go wrong. He was trying to get a pile going by gathering up stick and throwing on the fire. He had on old cotton clothes. May have even had on some polyester? Before he knew it his pants were on fire. Frayed cuffs I guess. He panicked and ran. Then he caught himself, stopped and beat out the fire with his hands. He has second degree burns on his hands and his legs. NO FUN!

NOMEX,a fabric designed not to burn is a cheap investment. My friend is a conservative sort of guy like most of us. He doesn’t want to spend money de doesn’t think he needs to spend. No one can fault him for that. But in this case a set of NOMEX coveralls would be a lot cheaper than the doctor bill for tending to the second degree burns, the cost of guaze banadages, and a whole lot less painful.

Think Safety! SAFETY, SAFETY, SAFETY !!! Minimize risk,

Prescribed Burning Season

January 14th, 2010 Filed Under Blog

Here in the Southeast it is almost burning time. John Stivers likes to say every day is a burning day and I won’t argue with that. We need to make decisions based on fuel moisture, KBDI, and the burn objective. But most old time burners have learned that usually during the last two weeks of February and the first two weeks of March conditions will get right. Cold fronts from the northwest will bring good drying weather and and steady winds. This is the time to burn young stands and places where scorch should be kept to a minimum. This is the time for fuel reduction burns and first “re-entry burns. Get you burn plans polished off, do your smoke screening, get your equipment ready, and your crew trained. The day is coming. Keep your Bic in your pocket.

Indian Burning in Clay County, Alabama

December 17th, 2009 Filed Under Blog

Excerpts from:
A Historical Analysis of the Creek Indian Hillabee Towns, Don C, East, 2008 iUniverse , Inc. New York Bloomigton
About:
Clay Country, Alabama

Page 123, Livestock Herdsmen
….”The pine forest had been kept clear of understory through annual burning by the Indians. The following pioneers continued the practice. The burning allowed wild oats, grasses, wild vetch, and pea vines to grow as summer grazing. The deep hollows and swamps were covered with dense cane breaks, furnishing the livestock winter grazing and protection from the elements.”

Page 142, Life in the Chapman Road Villages; Farming
Oral interview with John A. Cleveland
“First we had to clear the land and that was a big job. I especially remember the pines; they were great big trees. We would chop around the trees (girdle) to kill them. Then, when they died and fell, we would pile them up and burn them. We picked up all the rocks from the field and piled them up. We raised corn, cotton, vegetables, and some wheat. We had cows, pigs, chickens, and some sheep for wool. The cows were branded or marks put on their ears and they just ran loose. The chickens ran loose also so they could fend for themselves in the woods and fields.”

Right to Smoke

December 16th, 2009 Filed Under Blog

Does this indicate the direction we might be headed? Should we have a right to emit smoke law similar to our right to burn law?

Forest Service fined for Yakima Valley smoke
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

YAKIMA, Wash. — The Yakima Regional Clean Air Agency has fined the Forest Service $12,000 for smoke from a Sept. 28 controlled burn that drifted toward Yakima when the wind shifted.

The agency says the Naches Ranger District failed to assure that future burns don’t compromise air quality.

An agency spokesman, Cave Caprile, says it’s treating the Forest Service as it would anyone else. Forest Service officials don’t believe the Yakima agency has the authority to regulate smoke from their fires.

District Ranger Randall Shepard told The Yakima Herald-Republic rangers acted in good faith and received approval for the burn from the state Department of Natural Resources.

At least 17 residents of Tieton, Selah and Yakima complained about the smoke.

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