Joe Lowe, the Wildland Fire Coordinator for the State of South Dakota has written an opinion article for the Rapid City Journal about the relationship between pine beetle outbreaks and fire. Here are some excerpts:

In recent days, there has been much discussion about bark beetles and fire. With over 400,000 acres of our Black Hills attacked by pine beetles, the issue must be aggressively addressed.

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The pine beetle attacks present three different and unique set of fire problems depending on when the attacks occurred.

The first phase is in the early stages of the beetle attack. The trees are dying or dead with the needles still on them and the crowns are close together.

Under the tree canopy we have ladder fuels that allow the surface fire to step up into the dead trees. This is called a crown fire. In this example I would expect to see a rapidly spreading fire of great intensity to occur.

The fire does not have to drive off moisture in the trees to sustain combustion. Every firefighter understands these basic fire principles.

In the second phase the needles have fallen off and the tree trunk and branches are still standing. In this phase the fire would mainly be a surface fire with opportunities to suppress it.

During the third phase the trees start to fall and create timber litter on the forest floor.

The heavy fuels are now horizontally distributed, and will contribute to higher intensity surface fires.

Make no mistake about it. In my opinion, a fire problem does exist in the Black Hills Ponderosa forest that has been attacked by pine beetles.

In the article, Chief Lowe makes some very good points. He also mentions research being done on the relationships between fire and beetle outbreaks in lodgepole pine and Douglas fir forests which we covered on September 8, 2010. One research project, funded by the Joint Fire Science Program, is being conducted by William Romme and Philip Townsend in the greater Yellowstone ecosystem. Other related research is being done by Monica Turner and Martin Simard.

One of the key facts from the research that has come to light so far is that the very flammable volatile oils which fuel a fire in green pine needles begin to break down when the needles die, making them less likely to sustain a fire according to the researchers. Previously, this has not been widely recognized by firefighters and may seem counter-intuitive.

Research needs to specifically determine how the reduced volatile oil content in dead needles may or may not counter-balance the lower moisture content in the dead needles. Which fuels a fire more, the oils, or a lower fuel moisture? If it is the oils, as the research at this point leads us to believe, then beetle-killed trees with dead needles would be less of a fire problem than green trees. That is, the rate of spread, likelihood of a crown fire, and the resistance to control would be reduced.

And there is little argument among wildland fire professionals that dead standing pines without needles are less likely to sustain a crown fire than green trees. After the dead trees fall, a ground fire would produce a great deal of heat, but I believe the rate of spread and resistance to control would be much less than a fire in standing green trees.

As Chief Lowe correctly points out, other factors may also be considered when decisions are made about a beetle outbreak, including the monetary value of commercial timber, and the aesthetics of dead trees compared to a green forest in an area visited by tourists. The safety of firefighters and hikers can also be an issue as the trees fall. Fighting fire in a snag forest may not be feasible.

As you hear so often, more research is needed, especially in Ponderosa pine forests.

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UPDATE January 29, 2010

A paper has been recently published, titled “Do mountain pine beetle outbreaks change the probability of active crown fire in lodgepole pine forests?” Here is an excerpt from the abstract:

Modeling results suggested that undisturbed, red, and gray-stage stands were unlikely to exhibit transition of surface fires to tree crowns (torching), and that the likelihood of sustaining an active crown fire (crowning) decreased from undisturbed to gray-stage stands. Simulated fire behavior was little affected by beetle disturbance when wind speed was either below 40 km/h or above 60 km/h, but at intermediate wind speeds, probability of crowning in red- and gray-stage stands was lower than in undisturbed stands, and old post-outbreak stands were predicted to have passive crown fires. Results were consistent across a range of fuel moisture scenarios. Our results suggest that mountain pine beetle outbreaks in Greater Yellowstone may reduce the probability of active crown fire in the short term by thinning lodgepole pine canopies.

The paper is written by Martin Simard, William H. Romme, Jacob M. Griffin, and Monica G. Turner. A summary of their findings is HERE.

An article at NPR.org quotes a National Park Service employee who is running the pine beetle mitigation program at Mount Rushmore National Memorial:

“It’s a matter of controlling the exponential growth of this pine beetle,” says Bruce Weisman, the National Park ranger leading the fight against the insects. “We’ve seen this explosion and it’s coming over the ridgeline directly at us right now.”

Crews are cutting down trees below the four faces and feeding them into huge wood chippers. Weisman says to save this forest from destruction, the smaller overgrown pine trees on 500 acres of the park must come down. He says this is about more than beetles. Bug-killed trees are prone to burn, and one lightning strike could start a major wildfire.

“Our fuel loads would be so tremendous that [a] catastrophic firestorm would sweep right over the top of the memorial and it would be a catastrophic loss of all facilities,” he says.

Mount Rushmore administrative site, looking down from just below the sculpture, June 27, 2001. Photo by Bill Gabbert

There may be some legitimate reasons for thinning the trees in the Memorial, such as to help the remaining trees stay healthy so they can repel a beetle attack or to preserve a landscape that is pleasing to the human eye, but to prevent a “catastrophic” fire is not one of them. Science, research, and wildland fire behavior knowledge have shown that a forest that has been killed by beetles is not necessarily going to burn with more extreme fire behavior than a green forest. As soon as a pine tree dies, the very flammable volatile oils which cause a green tree to burn so well begin to break down. Less volatile oils means a fire will not burn as intensely. And, soon after the tree dies, the dead needles fall off and begin to decompose on the ground, providing fewer aerial fuels, making a crown fire less likely.

Mount Rushmore proposed spending $5.7 million to mitigate the beetles in the 1,200-acre Memorial; that was reduced to $2.7 million — about $2,196 an acre.

Another way to prevent the “catastrophic loss of all facilities” in a wildfire would be to implement Firewise principles, so that when the inevitable fire burns through the property the structures are more likely to survive. It is not IF, but WHEN.

Church's Park fire. Photo from InciWeb (no date or photo credit)

More firefighters are recognizing that fire behavior in beetle-killed forests is not necessarily more extreme than you would see in green stands of trees. The Church’s Park fire near Fraser, Colorado is burning in areas that have been affected by the mountain pine beetle. The fire has burned 530 acres and is 30% contained. Here is an excerpt from Denver’s channel 7:

The fire is burning in an area filled with green pines and dead, gray-colored trees that have been killed by pine beetles.

“Because of the beetle kill, there’s a whole lot of dead trees,” said Austin Deganhart, one of the first people to report the fire Sunday afternoon. “All of the lodgepole pines stand anywhere from 20 to 40, 50 feet tall and they’re totally dry and dead. That’s what makes up the majority of our forest up here.”

Fire officials said the dead trees post a great danger because they may fall on firefighters.

“There is a significant amount of pine beetle killed trees in the fire area. The greatest danger from the trees is not in terms of fire behavior, but hazards and risks that are posed to our firefighters on the ground,” said Geoff Bell, the fire’s incident commander.

Geoff Bell is the Forest Fire Management Officer for the Arapaho-Roosevelt National Forest, working out of Fort Collins, Colorado. He is a former Superintendent of the Tatanka Hot Shots (still photos and video of the crew) on the Black Hills National Forest in South Dakota.

An earlier article, which has been removed, even quoted the local Sheriff as saying the beetle-affected trees did not increase fire behavior. Oddly, in Colorado the County Sheriff is responsible for fire protection on unincorporated private land, so it’s good in this case that the Sheriff has some knowledge of wildland fire. I wonder if in some states the local fire chief is responsible for law enforcement?

Seven Senators ask for $49 million to fight beetles

Meanwhile, seven U. S. Senators signed a letter that was sent to the Secretary of Agriculture asking for an additional $49 million in just one U.S. Forest Service region, their Rocky Mountain Region, to fight the beetles. Part of their justification was that the forests, because of the beetles, are “at risk of catastrophic fire”. Last year $40 million was appropriated in the region for beetle mitigation. *sigh* Your tax dollars at work.

Our other articles about beetles.

The dirty little secret that some firefighters and land managers either don’t know or will not admit to knowing, is that forests that have been affected by mountain pine beetles are less likely to burn as intensely as green forests. When the needles on a pine tree die, the volatile oils that cause a green, healthy pine tree to torch and support a crown fire, break down. And a tree with no needles is not a good candidate for a crown fire either — less so than a green tree.

Sometimes land managers, when faced with a landscape of brown, ugly, beetle-killed trees, fall all over themselves finding additional taxpayer funds to “fix” the problem, such as a state Governor vowing to order his state employees to storm into a federal wilderness if there are any fires in the area, which has some beetle-killed trees, or a 1,200-acre park asking for $5.7 million to fix a possible future beetle problem.

Some scientists have tried to say that the wildfire potential in areas affected by beetles is over-stated. But now there is new research that further confirms that point of view. And it appeared on the NASA web site, whose satellites were used to collect some of the data.

University of Wisconsin forest ecologists Monica Turner and Phil Townsend, in collaboration with Yellowstone National Park Vegetation Management Specialist Roy Renkin, are studying the connection in the forests near Yellowstone National Park. Roy, by the way, is also a qualified Fire Behavior Analyst, who I have worked with many times on fires. He knows his stuff.

Here is an excerpt from the NASA article:

Their preliminary analysis indicates that large fires do not appear to occur more often or with greater severity in forest tracts with beetle damage. In fact, in some cases, beetle-killed forest swaths may actually be less likely to burn. What they’re discovering is in line with previous research on the subject.

The results may seem at first counterintuitive, but make sense when considered more carefully. First, while green needles on trees appear to be more lush and harder to burn, they contain high levels of very flammable volatile oils. When the needles die, those flammable oils begin to break down. As a result, depending on the weather conditions, dead needles may not be more likely to catch and sustain a fire than live needles.

Second, when beetles kill a lodgepole pine tree, the needles begin to fall off and decompose on the forest floor relatively quickly. In a sense, the beetles are thinning the forest, and the naked trees left behind are essentially akin to large fire logs. However, just as you can’t start a fire in a fireplace with just large logs and no kindling, wildfires are less likely to ignite and carry in a forest of dead tree trunks and low needle litter.

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“Both fire and beetle damage are natural parts of system and have been since forests developed,” Townsend said. “What we have right now is a widespread attack that we haven’t seen before, but it is a natural part of the system.”

Renkin agrees with the assessment. “Disturbances like insect outbreaks and fire are recognized to be integral to the health of the forests,” he said, “and it has taken ecologists most of this century to realize as much. Yet when these disturbances occur, our emotional psyche leads us to say the forests are ‘unhealthy.’ Bugs and fires are neither good nor bad, they just are.”

What this boils down to is that the rate of spread and flame lengths of a fire in beetle-killed lodgepole pines will be less than you would see in green stands of lodgepoles. But fighting fire in an area that has a large number of dead trees can be extremely hazardous for firefighters due to the snags falling as they burn. Green trees are less likely to burn through and fall in the first few hours or days after a flame front moves through. Too many firefighters have been killed or injured by falling snags, or while cutting down snags.

There is a lot of hysteria out there in response to the pine beetle  outbreak that has affected at least 5 million acres in Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and South Dakota, and even more acres in British Columbia, which has been called ground zero for the beetles. Some people are suggesting that beetle-killed trees will inevitably lead to catastrophic wildfires and that massive logging or insecticide-spraying operations must begin in order to protect our citizens. But the science does not support that school of thought.

Beetle-killed trees can be more flammable during the relatively short period of time when the needles on the pine trees have been killed and have turned red, but after the needles fall to the ground the dead trees are less likely to support a crown fire than a live forest.

Here is an excerpt from an article by George Wuerthner that appeared today at HelenaIR.com. The entire article is here.

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The current pine beetle “outbreak” that has led to tree mortality among Rocky Mountain forests has prompted some people to suggest that beetles are “destroying” our forests and that beetle-killed trees will invariably lead to larger wildfires.

At the heart of this issue are flawed assumptions about wildfires, what constitutes a healthy forest and the options available to humans in face of natural processes that are inconvenient and get in the way of our designs.

While it may seem intuitive that dead trees will lead to more fires, there is little scientific evidence to support the contention that beetle-killed trees substantially increase risk of large blazes. In fact, there is evidence to suggest otherwise.

Bark beetles tend to focus on larger trees, and not all trees are killed. This has important implications for fire risk. Fine fuels — not large snags — are the prime ingredient for sustained fire. After a major beetle outbreak, and once the red needles and small branches have broken off the trees, all that remains are upright big boles that do not burn particularly well.

To sustain a blaze among a snag forest you usually need fine fuels to maintain the heating process. That is why one uses small kindling and other fine fuels to start a campfire, and must continuously feed small wood and/or a sufficient bed of coals under the bigger logs to keep the fire going.

Ultimately, fuels do not control fires. If the climate/weather isn’t conducive for fire spread, it doesn’t much matter how much dead wood you have piled up, you won’t get a large fire. As an extreme example, think of all the dead wood lying around on the ground in old-growth West Coast rainforests — tons of fuel, but few fires — because it’s too wet to burn.

Large blazes are driven by a combination of extreme drought, low humidity, high temperatures and, most importantly, wind. These conditions do not occur in the same place at the same time very frequently — which is why there are often decades to centuries between major blazes and most fires go out without burning more than a few acres.

In the Rockies between 1980 and 2003, there were more than 56,000 fires that charred 9 million acres. But 96 percent of the fires — more than 55,000 of those blazes — charred less than 4 percent of the total acreage burned; the climatic conditions just weren’t conducive to fire spread, even though fuels were abundant. By contrast, less than 0.1 percent of the fires during that period were responsible for more than half of the acreage burned.

Even more surprising is that a forest dominated by bug-killed snags may be less vulnerable to a blaze than a green forest. Just as a recently burned forest often acts as a fire break due to limited fine fuels, bug-killed trees affect fire spread in much the same way. In fact, green trees stressed by drought can have internal moisture levels drop lower than kiln dried lumber, but because they still possess flammable resin-filled needles and small branches that burn almost explosively, green trees are sometimes more flammable than dead trees.

Even more importantly, bark beetles are increasingly recognized by ecologists as “ecosystem engineers,” much as beavers are now recognized as important to the creation of wetlands and riparian areas. Beetles are essential to maintaining biodiversity and healthy forests.

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Read the rest of the article here.

George Wuerthner is an ecologist, writer and photographer with 34 published books, including “Wildfire: A Century of Failed Forest Policy.”

Thanks Dick

Our hired help in Washington is implementing elementary school tactics to run our country.

From the Associated Press today:

DENVER (AP) _ U.S. Sen. Mark Udall and a Colorado state senator have gotten caught in the crossfire over health care. A hearing Tuesday on Udall’s bill to protect communities from bark beetles was canceled after Republicans angry over the passage of health insurance reform legislation blocked it by using an obscure Senate rule requiring a unanimous consent to hold hearings scheduled after 2 p.m.

If we give them the benefit of the doubt, they canceled the meeting because working past 2 p.m. would have been contrary to their preferred working hours, not because they threw a *hissy fit over the fact that some legislation was passed.

From Senator Udall’s office today:

IMPORTANT UPDATE: Today’s hearing on Senator Udall’s bark beetle legislation has been canceled due to Republican Obstruction

Washington, D.C. — Today’s scheduled hearing on Senator Mark Udall’s bill to protect communities from wildfire and falling trees as a result of bark beetle infestation has been canceled due to Republican obstructionism. Angry over the passage of health insurance reform legislation, Republican leaders are using an arcane rule, which requires the unanimous consent of Senators in both parties to agree to hearings scheduled after 2 p.m., and have objected to the bark beetle hearing and vowed not to cooperate with Democrats for the rest of the year.

“It is critical that this hearing go forward — especially with Senator Gibbs in Washington to explain how important this bipartisan bill is to Coloradans. Delay just prevents urgently needed resources from going to Colorado communities threatened by beetle-killed trees,” Senator Udall said. “I strongly urge my colleagues to re-think their strategy — this is a matter of public safety, and that’s too important for political gamesmanship.”

The bark beetle bill was introduced in November by U.S. Senators Mark Udall, D-CO, and James Risch, R-ID. Senator Risch is a graduate of  the University of Idaho’s School of Forestry.

*Hissy fit, from Urban Dictionary:

noun. A sudden outburst of temper, often used to describe female anger at something trivial. Originally regional from American South. Thought to originate from contraction of “hysterical fit.”