Not only did forest thinning slow the spread of last
summer’s Hayman Fire in Colorado, it helped prevent
subsequent damage from erosion, according to a study conducted by
the U.S. Forest Service (HCN, 7/8/02: The anatomy of
fire).
The blaze, which was the largest fire in Colorado
history, slowed when it hit the sites of two large
“fuels-reduction” projects, one an 8,000-acre
prescribed burn, the other a 1,500-acre timber sale and thinning
project, says Ted Moore, fire-management officer with the Pike-San
Isabel National Forest and the Cimarron-Comanche National
Grasslands. He explains that needles on most ponderosa pines in
thinned areas did not burn; when they fell to the ground later,
they provided ground cover that cut erosion 40 percent.
Now, the Forest Service is planning to step up the pace of its
fuels-reduction projects in the Pike-San Isabel, where the Hayman
Fire occurred, says Moore. Forest officials have developed a Front
Range Fuels Treatment Partnership for forests in eastern Colorado,
and requested an additional $4 million to $6 million this
year.
Conservationists support fuels-reduction programs in
the “wildland-urban interface” along the Front Range,
says Suzanne Jones, assistant regional director for The Wilderness
Society in Denver. “Thinning” projects farther from
civilization have raised concerns, however. The Forest Service is
conducting many thinning projects deep in the backcountry under the
guise of fuels reduction, Jones says. “We have a concern
where the Forest Service is using the public’s fear of fire
to do broad-scale logging in the backcountry.”
For
information on the Hayman Fire and recovery, visit
www.fs.fed.us/r2/psicc/.
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Forest thinning slows fires, increases concerns.
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