Lessons from the October 2003 Wildfires in Southern California

Jon E. Keeley, C.J. Fotheringham, and Max A. Moritz

The Southern California fires of late Oct. 2003 burned 742,000 ac and destroyed 3,361 homes is the focus of this article. and 26 lives. Factors leading up to this event were very different between forests, which com- prised about 5% of the area burned, and shrublands. Three lessons are (1) although these Separating Forest Fires from Shrubland fires were massive, they were not unprecedented, and future fires of this magnitude are to be Burning expected; (2) the current fire management policy is not effective at preventing these massive These southern California fires fires; and (3) future developments need to plan for these natural fire events much the same burned through diverse plant commu- way we currently incorporate engineering solutions to earthquakes and other natural cata- nities. The proportion of different veg- strophes. etation types was not proportional to

ABSTRACT the media coverage and thus there is widespread belief that these were forest Keywords: firestorm; fuel mosaics; historical fires; Santa Ana winds; policy fires. However, coniferous forests com- prised only about 5% of the total acreage burned (frap.cdf.ca.gov). he southern California fires of interface. A total of 3,361 homes and 26 Media focus on these forest fires was late Oct. 2003 were, cumula- lives were lost in this event. It is without undoubtedly due to the fact that they Ttively, the single largest event in a doubt the costliest disaster to befall burned in unnaturally intense and California’s recent history. Over California, exceeding previous fires, spectacular crown fires in forests with 742,000 ac (300,000 ha) burned during earthquakes, and other natural disasters. important recreational value and rela- one week, and in many cases fires Understanding the factors leading up to tively high-density housing. burned right up to the edge of heavily this event and the appropriate human Factors leading up to these forest urbanized areas, or worse right through response necessary to reduce the chances fires are quite different from those re- neighborhoods at the wildland-urban of a repeat of these catastrophic impacts sponsible for the bulk of the 742,000

26 Journal of Forestry • October/November 2004 ac burned that week. Prior to settle- ment of the region, the mixed conifer forests in southern California, like sim- ilar forest types throughout the South- west, apparently experienced a natural fire regime of frequent mostly low-in- tensity surface fires (Allen et al. 2002). Fire suppression policy has been very effective at excluding fires from these forests for three reasons: the montane climate results in a shorter fire season, ignitions are commonly from light- ning, under weather conditions not usually conducive to rapid fire spread, and surface fuels produce lower flame lengths. These characteristics have led to a highly successful fire suppression campaign that can be equated with fire exclusion. As a consequence, there has been an unnatural accumulation of surface fuels, coupled with increased density of young shade-tolerant trees (Minnich et al. 1995). Increased den- sity of young trees is perhaps the most serious problem because these saplings Figure 1. Remains of cabin in southern California San Bernardino Mountains burned by the Old Fire act as ladder fuels that change fire be- in Oct. 2003 (photo by J. Keeley). havior from surface fires to crown fires. As with most of our Western Forests, Bernardino Forest are that three- unnaturally intense competition for southern California conifer forests have fourths of the pines were killed by a water. However, the lack of correlation been logged one or more times (Dodge combination of drought followed by could also indicate that even the lowest 1975, Minnich 1988), and this may subsequent bark beetle infestation. density forests were stressed due to have had a greater impact on creation Conventional wisdom suggests that over-stocking of young trees. of ladder fuels than fire exclusion, al- this massive mortality was also a though no one has clearly sorted out byproduct of fire suppression because Shrubland Burning the relative contributions. Ladder fuels the increased density of saplings inten- Chaparral and related shrublands were certainly a critical factor in deter- sified competition for water. The pre- dominated most of the landscape mining property damage from these re- sumption is that if these forests had re- burned during the Oct. 2003 fires. cent forest fires (Figure 1). tained their natural fire regime, the There is ongoing debate over whether Other factors contributed to the fire lower tree density would have resulted such massive fires are natural but infre- hazard in southern California conifer- in much greater survival during the re- quent events in the chaparral ecosys- ous forests. In the past few years, there cent drought. This is consistent with tem or are the result of modern fire has been an extraordinarily severe our understanding of tree ecophysiol- suppression, as appears to be the case drought that has resulted in major ogy; however, it should be noted that with conifer forests. The 2003 mortality, particularly in pines. This re- observations do not indicate there to firestorm is relevant to this debate, pro- gionwide drought and subsequent pine be a strong correlation between per- viding an important case study that we mortality was a factor in the severity of centage prefire mortality and tree den- can learn from and use to guide re- the 2002 Rodeo-Chedeski Fire in Ari- sity (John Regglebrugge, USDA Forest building efforts and future manage- zona as well. Estimates for some parts Service, Dec. 2003), which would be ment activities. of the southern California San expected if fire suppression had caused The dominant paradigm governing

October/November 2004 • Journal of Forestry 27 fire management in southern California shrublands has long been the model that presumes fire suppression has suc- cessfully excluded fire and caused an unnatural accumulation of fuels (Min- nich 1983, Minnich and Chou 1997). This model assumes that the age and spatial pattern of vegetation are strong constraints on fire spread, even during periods of extreme fire weather. These authors propose that large chaparral wildfires are modern artifacts of fire suppression and they can be eliminated by landscape-scale rotational burning (Minnich and Dezzani 1991, Minnich 1998). Fire management plans for USDA Forest Service national forests in southern California all have incorpo- Figure 2. Fuel mosaics within the perimeters of the 2003 fires in San Diego County, California, which rated aspects of this model (Conard and demonstrate that the 2003 fires burned through a variety of fuel ages. Three fire perimeters shown Weise 1998). are, from north to south: the Paradise, Cedar, and Otay Fires (data from frap.cdf.ca.gov). The primary support for this model is a demonstration of larger fires north drought. Under these conditions, fire- exceeded all of the Oct. 2003 burning of the US border than observed on fighters are forced into defensive ac- because there was another fire that ig- similar landscapes in Baja California. tions and can do very little to stop nited that week near Escondido in San This model has been questioned on a these firestorms. Diego County and in 2 days the same variety of grounds. Foremost is the ob- Santa Ana winds blew it all the way to servation that despite heroic efforts by Lessons Learned downtown San Diego (Barrett 1935), a firefighters during the 20th century, Three lessons can be extracted from distance roughly equal to the long axis fire suppression policy has failed to re- the 2003 fire event: 1) Although these of the recent Cedar Fire (Figure 2). The duce the natural fire frequency and, as fires were massive, their size was not un- primary difference between these fires is a consequence, fuels are not unnatu- precedented, and thus we can expect that California’s population has grown rally old and fire rotation intervals are similar fire events in the future, 2) The about 30-fold during this period between 30 and 40 years (Conard and current fire management policy is not (www.census.gov) and urban sprawl has Weise 1998, Keeley et al. 1999, Keeley effective at preventing these massive placed huge populations adjacent to wa- and Fotheringham 2001, Moritz fires, and 3) Future developments need tersheds of dangerous fuels (Figure 3). 2003). An emerging view is that large to plan for these natural fire events Because over 95% of all fires on these fires under extreme fire weather condi- much the same way we currently incor- landscapes are started by people, there tions are only minimally constrained porate engineering solutions to earth- has been a concomitant increase in fire by the age and spatial patterns of fuels, quakes and other natural catastrophes. frequency and increased chance of igni- and this appears to hold over broad re- Lesson 1. The firestorm during the tions during Santa Ana wind events gions of central and southern Califor- last week of Oct. 2003 was a natural (Keeley and Fotheringham 2003). nia (Moritz et al. 2004). event that has been repeated on these The important lesson here is that Southern California shrublands are landscapes for eons (Mensing et al. massive fires have occurred at periodic an anomaly because, unlike many 1999, Keeley and Fotheringham 2003). intervals in the past and likely will western US forests, fire suppression While the recent 273,230-ac Cedar occur again in the future. It may be policy cannot be equated with fire ex- Fire (Figure 2) was the largest in Cali- more useful from a planning and man- clusion. The primary reason is because fornia since official fire records have agement perspective to see these events this region has what fire climatologists been kept, there are historical accounts as we currently view 100 year flood have labeled as the worst fire climate in of even larger fire events. For example, events or other such cyclical disasters. the country (Schroeder et al. 1964). during the last week of Sept. 1889, a Lesson 2. Currently fire manage- While it is generally true that massive Santa Ana wind-driven fire east of ment is based on a philosophy that fuel fires anywhere in the West are accom- Santa Ana in Orange County, Califor- management practices can control the panied by severe fire weather, in south- nia reportedly burned 100 miles north ultimate size of these massive fire ern California these fires typically and south and 10-18 miles in width events. This philosophy characterizes occur during the autumn Santa Ana (Los Angeles Times, Sept. 27, 1889). the response to catastrophic fires on the winds. These foehn winds reach speeds This event would have been three California landscape for the past half of 50–60 miles per hour and occur times larger than the recent Cedar Fire. century, and despite this policy there every autumn at the end of a 6-month Collectively, Sept. 1889 would have has been an ever increasing loss of prop-

28 Journal of Forestry • October/November 2004 land landscapes needs to change from simply measuring “acres treated” to con- sideration of their strategic placement, and this change in management philos- ophy is being recommended by the largest National Park Service unit in southern California (Marti Witter, Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, Oct. 2003). Fuel manipulations, in particular rotational prescription burning, may have some beneficial impacts on post- fire events because younger fuels are as- sociated with reduced fire severity, and this may affect both vegetation recov- Figure 3. Typical wildland-urban interface mix in southern California (NPS photo). ery and sediment losses. Extensive studies of postfire recovery following erty and lives due to wildfires. The pre- fires burning under calm wind condi- the 1993 fires in southern California ferred treatment is prescription burn- tions have been documented to burn found that the impact of high-severity ing, applied on a rotational basis across out when the fire encounters young fires was variable, with both positive the landscape. Theoretically, fuel reduc- fuels, and the lack of wind limits the and negative impacts on postfire recov- tion treatments are expected to prevent likelihood of fire brands jumping these ery (Keeley 1998). Thus, it would be large wildfires by creating fuel mosaics young fuels. These fires, however, sel- premature at this point to conduct ex- that include patches of young fuel, dom present major problems for fire- pensive fuel treatments with the expec- which theoretically are expected to act fighting crews, and do not pose a major tation of producing major changes in as barriers to fire spread. The extent to threat to the loss of property and lives. postfire recovery. Recent comparisons which landscape level fuel treatments Thus, serious attention needs to be of sediment loss from chaparral water- are effective is a function of weather paid to whether or not fuel treatments sheds have provided evidence that rota- conditions during the fire event. Under are cost-effective for these fires. tional burning at 5-year intervals has extreme weather conditions, there is The key to effective use of prefire fuel the potential for greatly decreasing the overwhelming evidence that young manipulations in crown-fire eco-systems immediate postfire sediment loss fuels, or even fuel breaks (e.g., Figure such as chaparral is their strategic place- (Loomis et al. 2003). However, in the 4), will not act as a barrier to fire spread. ment. Under severe weather, lower fuel long run this may not be cost-effective This is quite evident for the recent fires. loads will not stop the spread of fire, but for several reasons. One critical deter- Crossing nearly the entire width from they do reduce fire intensity and thus minant of sediment loss is the first win- north to south of the east-west burning provide defensible space for fire sup- ter precipitation, high rainfall years Cedar Fire were substantial swaths of pression crews. Thus, the key benefit is being particularly damaging. Prescrip- vegetation that were less than 10 years to enhance firefighter safety and there- tion burning at 5-year intervals greatly of age, not just in one but two parts of fore strategic placement is critical to increases the chances of fires being fol- that fire (Figure 2). The Otay Fire ex- their success. Much of the southern Cal- lowed by an El Niño year of high rain- hibited the same phenomenon (Figure ifornia shrubland landscape is far too fall, relative to fires at the normal re- 2); the fire burned through thousands steep to provide defensible space regard- turn interval of 35 years. In addition, of acres that were only 7 years of age. less of fuel structure, and thus fuel ma- the cumulative sediment loss over the The primary reason young fuels cannot nipulations in these areas are unlikely to long term would be much greater for act as a barrier to fire spread under these provide economically viable benefits. 5-year burning intervals because there severe weather conditions is that if the Fuel manipulations will be most cost-ef- would be multiple peak discharges over high winds do not push the fire fective when focused on the wildland- the normal 35-year interval. Perhaps through the young age classes, they will urban interface. This is increasingly the most importantly, burning at 5-year spread the fire around them, or jump case as the interface increases in extent intervals will almost certainly effect over them from fire brands that can and complexity, diverting fire fighting type conversion to alien grasslands, spread up to a mile or more. resources away from direct attack on which in addition to having negative This does not mean there is no role these configurations. Often times dur- resource impacts would greatly increase for fuel manipulations in the southern ing severe fire weather homes are lost be- the chances of slope failure in many of California fire management arsenal, cause firefighters refuse to enter areas these very steep watersheds. but their application needs to be care- that lack a sufficient buffer zone of re- Lesson 3. Californians need to em- fully considered if they are to be effec- duced fuel to provide defensible space. brace a different model of how to view tive and provide benefits equal to or ex- In terms of management goals, the met- fires on these landscapes. Our response ceeding their cost. For example, some ric for fuels treatments on these shrub- needs to be tempered by the realization

October/November 2004 • Journal of Forestry 29 Figure 4. Prefire fuel breaks that failed to act as barriers to fire spread during the Cedar Fire. These were adjacent to Scripps Ranch where hundreds of homes were destroyed (photo by J. Keeley). that these are natural events that can- by allowing the close juxtaposition of combination of buffer zones and better not be eliminated from the southern developments and natural habitats. planning, we may be able to engineer California landscape. In this respect, While there may have been isolated in- an environment that minimizes their we can learn much from the science of stances where this was the case, there is impact on property and lives. earthquake or other natural disaster evidence that effective preserve design There are two important realities to management. No one pretends they assisted in reducing the loss of human fuel management at the wildland- can stop them, rather they engineer in- life and structures. The overriding goal urban interface that will potentially frastructure to minimize impacts. of habitat management planning is to cause problems in the future. One is Fire management needs to do more create significant size areas that provide the increasing complexity of landown- to convey to the public their limitations contiguous habitat and are not infringed ership and different management goals in stopping massive Santa Ana wind- on by development. This goal is very of neighbors. Fuel clearances necessary driven fires. For much of the past half consistent with increasing fire safety for to ensure structure survival may not al- century we have had a false belief that the public. The best example of where ways be possible because of alternative how or where we allowed new develop- this planning process worked well is the management goals by neighbors. Per- ments was irrelevant to fire safety be- Otay Fire (Figure 2), which burned a haps a bigger problem is the skyrocket- cause fire managers could prevent fires substantial portion of a contiguous habi- ing cost of fuel manipulation treat- from burning across the wildland-urban tat management area and no expensive ments, illustrated by the recognition interface. Undoubtedly there has been homes or lives were lost. Allowing devel- that fuel treatments in many western substantial pressure on fire managers to opment on an island within this pre- US forests may need to remove larger convey an overly confident image and serve would have meant setting struc- commercially valuable timber to pay not to highlight their limitations. These tures within indefensible boundaries. for treatments. However, extraction of recent fires should be recognized as a commercial products is not an option wake up call to the fact that there are in- Conclusions for chaparral shrublands, and thus herent limitations to containment of In summary, fire science tells us some creative thinking will be required Santa Ana wind-driven fires. there will be other massive wildfires on to pay for the necessary buffer system Some newspaper accounts have sug- the southern California landscape. Fire needed to protect urban developments. gested that the conservation planning ef- management activities cannot prevent An important area for future research is forts in southern California contributed these large fires; however, through a the use of normal features of develop-

30 Journal of Forestry • October/November 2004 ment infrastructure as buffers. For ex- (ed.). University of California, Davis, Water Re- ham, Department of Evolutionary Biol- sources Center, Report No. 75. ample, in southern California many MINNICH, R.A., M.G. BARBOUR, J.H. BURK, AND R.F. ogy, Ecology, and Evolution, University new developments are built around FERNAU. 1995. Sixty years of change in Californian of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095. golf courses or recreational parks. conifer forests of the San Bernardino Mountains. Max A. Moritz, Ecosystem Sciences Divi- However, placing these on the periph- Conservation Biology 9:902–914. sion, Environmental Science, Policy, and MINNICH, R.A., AND Y.H. CHOU. 1997. Wildland fire ery could act as an important barrier to patch dynamics in the chaparral of southern Califor- Management Department, University of fire spread. Making these designs part nia and northern Baja California. International Jour- California, Berkeley, CA 94720. of the developers responsibility would nal of Wildland Fire 7:221. have value added in that it would en- MINNICH, R.A. 1998. Landscapes, land-use and fire pol- courage less fingering of developments icy: Where do large fires come from? P. 133–158 in Large forest fires, Moreno, J.M. (ed.). Leiden, The into dangerous wildland fuels because Netherlands: Backhuys Publishers. such configurations would increase the MORITZ, M.A. 2003. Spatiotemporal analysis of controls costs of buffer zone construction. on shrubland fire regimes: Age dependency and fire hazard. Ecology 84:351–361. MORITZ, M.A., J.E. KEELEY, E.A. JOHNSON, AND A.A. Literature Cited SCHAFFNER. 2004. Testing a basic assumption of ALLEN, C.D., M. SAVAGE, D.A. FALK, K.F. SUCKLING, shrubland fire management: How important is fuel T.W. S WETNAM, T. SCHULKE, P.B. STACEY, P. MOR- age? Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment GAN, M. HOFFMAN, AND J.T. KLINGEL. 2002. Eco- 2:65–70. logical restoration of southwestern ponderosa pine SCHROEDER, M.J., et al. 1964. Synoptic weather types asso- ecosystems: A broad perspective. Ecological Applica- ciated with critical fire weather. Washington, DC: US tions 12:1418–1433. Department of Commerce, National Bureau of Stan- BARRETT, L.A. 1935. A record of forest and field fires in dards, Institute for Applied Technology, AD 449-630. California from the days of the early explorers to the cre- 372 p. ation of the forest reserves. San Francisco, CA: USDA Forest Service. CONARD, S.G., AND D.R. WEISE. 1998. Management of Jon E. Keeley ([email protected]), US fire regime, fuels, and fire effects in southern Califor- Geological Survey, Western Ecologi-cal nia chaparral: Lessons from the past and thoughts for the future. Tall Timbers Ecology Conference Proceedings Research Center, Sequoia-Kings Canyon 20:342–350. Field Station, Three Rivers, CA 93271, DODGE, J.M. 1975. Vegetational changes associated with and Department of Ecology and Evolu- land use and fire history in San Diego County. Ph.D. tionary Biology, University of California, dissertation, University of California, Riverside, CA. Los Angeles, CA 90095. C.J. Fothering- KEELEY, J.E. 1998. Postfire ecosystem recovery and man- agement: The October 1993 large fire episode in Cal- ifornia. P. 69–90 in Large forest fires, Moreno, J.M. (ed.). Leiden, The Netherlands: Backhuys Publishers. KEELEY, J.E., AND C.J. FOTHERINGHAM. 2001. Historic fire regime in Southern California shrublands. Con- servation Biology 15:1536–1548. KEELEY, J.E., AND C.J. FOTHERINGHAM. 2003. Impact of past, present, and future fire regimes on North Amer- ican mediterranean shrublands. P. 218–262 in Fire and climatic change in temperate ecosystems of the West- ern Americas, Veblen, T.T., W.L. Baker, G. Montene- gro, and T.W. Swetnam (eds.). New York: Springer. KEELEY, J.E., C.J. FOTHERINGHAM, AND M. MORAIS. 1999. Reexamining fire suppression impacts on brushland fire regimes. Science 284:1829–1832. LOOMIS, J., P. WOHLGEMUTH, A. GONZALE-CABAN, AND D. ENGLISH. 2003. Economic benefits of reducing fire- related sediment in southwestern fire-prone ecosys- tems. Water Resources Research 39(No 9, WES 3):1–8. MENSING, S.A., J. MICHAELSEN, AND R. BYRNE. 1999. A 560-year record of Santa Ana fires reconstructed from charcoal deposited in the Santa Barbara Basin, Cali- fornia. Quaternary Research 51:295–305. MINNICH, R.A. 1983. Fire mosaics in southern California and northern Baja California. Science 219: 1287–1294. MINNICH, R.A. 1988. The biogeography of fire in the San Bernardino Mountains, California. University of California Publications in Botany 28:1–120. MINNICH, R.A., AND R.J. DEZZANI. 1991. Suppression, fire behavior, and fire magnitudes in Californian chap- arral at the urban/wildland interface. P. 67–83 in Cal- ifornia watersheds at the urban interface, proceedings of the third biennial watershed conference, DeVries, J.J.

October/November 2004 • Journal of Forestry 31 increases in world temperature are anything “quakes” have a much greater impact on To me, as I brought up at the confer- but cyclical. crude oil prices and production than do es- ence, the greatest deterrent to IFMP in the It is true that “each American uses 3.5 timates of known reserves. United States is the use of Scribner log scale times as many forest products as the average Kerry Livengood to measure logs. Scribner log scale made person in the world.” Has anyone persuaded Alexandria, LA sense when we were selling large defective Americans to do otherwise? We are a democ- logs; it makes no sense in measuring our sec- racy with a robust economy. If Americans The March 2005 issue on intensive for- ond-growth logs of today. The rest of the wish to change that, let them, but I think est management for wood fiber is the corpo- world is on cubic or better metric log scales; Moore should be careful what she wishes for. rate bottom line model. This is the share- they are straightforward and directly compa- Finally, Moore states “that foresters are holder model, and in certain forest types rable. The Scribner scale that was developed confounded when their work is challenged calls primarily for clearcutting. It is, in fact, 150 years ago is not comparable to anything. with a different vision of the forest.” I dis- the same as big agriculture. Scribner inaccurately and inconsis- agree. We are not confounded; we are mor- In my view, better forestry is best on tently only accounts for 20–30% of the ally outraged by the demonstrably inaccu- smaller ownerships where the bottom line is product that comes out of small logs. The rate claims that people, such as she and not wood fiber alone, but is geared to a variety Scribner scale allows for a knowledgeable Willer, have so often made. of silvicultural treatments. All influenced by buyer to take unfair advantage of a less than Timothy La Farge existing conditions such as slope etc. Other knowledgeable seller. San Francisco, CA values can be given due consideration as one Alan J. Thayer result. It means, as a tradeoff, less net revenue. Vancouver, WA I was very surprised to learn from Fred- It becomes a philosophical question as to erick L. Kirschenmann (p. 88, Mar. 2005) whether the fiber production-profit strategy is Correction that “fossil fuel. . . has now been depleted.” best in the long run or is in accordance with In “Lessons from the October 2003 The US Department of Energy labels coal, Natural Law. What is Natural Law? That is the Wildfires in Southern California” by Keeley et oil, and natural gas as fossil fuels. Even the reason it is a philosophical question, i.e., the al. (Oct./Nov. 2004), Figure 2 was mistakenly 1972 Club of Rome’s study “Limits to drive for production alone versus being conser- printed without its color key. The correct fig- Growth” in 1972 predicted a 111-year sup- vative. Intensive management for fiber is not ure and legend are reprinted below. ply of coal even assuming that consumption conservative in nature, but is akin to exploita- grew at an exponential rate. And though we tion. Repeated shorter rotations on the same passed their estimated 31-year static index soils results in long-term reduction in the or- for petroleum last year, I am still buying gas- ganic component. Intensive management uti- ABSTRACT oline made from crude oil that has averaged lizing selective prescriptions is likely to be more in the $10–20 per barrel range for the last 50 compatible long-term, where selection is pos- years when the rate of inflation is accounted sible. This is even possible here in the Douglas- for over that time period. The present real fir region, but is not done on large ownerships price is even lower than it was during the due to cost. “energy crisis” of 1973 and the spikes in the Societal or business focus on the bot- early 1980s. This kind of exaggeration tom line has its place, but is too dominant sounds like press releases from some envi- overall. Outsourcing is just one result of this ronmental group and inclines me to take short-sighted ethic. many of Kirschenmann’s other statements H.E. Hays with a grain of salt. If this article was peer Bainbridge Island, WA reviewed then I would suggest the reviewers need to review a good economics text such as I attended the January 2005 Portland, “Economics, Principles and Policy” by Wil- Oregon Symposia on Intensive Forest Man- liam J. Baumol and Alan S. Blinder. Some agement Potential (IFMP) in the Pacific places to start would be p. 471 of the book or Northwest. I like the articles and the format the websites of the Department of Energy or the Journal of Forestry used to revisit IMFP. Figure 2. Fuel mosaics within the perimeters the Department of Commerce. Another I was Crown Zellerbachs (CZ) Re- of the 2003 fires in San Diego County, Cal- source I found interesting is the report on source Manager until 1985, and for the last ifornia, which demonstrate that the 2003 the history of crude oil prices at www.wtrg 20 years I have been intensively managing fires burned through a variety of fuel ages. .com/prices.htm. Based on my limited my own tree farms in Oregon and Washing- Three fire perimeters shown are, from north knowledge of the subject, it appears that po- ton. I am a member of Oregon Small Wood- to south: the Paradise, Cedar, and Otay litical upheaval, wars, and economic lands and Washington Farm Forestry. Fires (data from frap.cdf.ca.gov).

162 Journal of Forestry • June 2005 increases in world temperature are anything “quakes” have a much greater impact on To me, as I brought up at the confer- but cyclical. crude oil prices and production than do es- ence, the greatest deterrent to IFMP in the It is true that “each American uses 3.5 timates of known reserves. United States is the use of Scribner log scale times as many forest products as the average Kerry Livengood to measure logs. Scribner log scale made person in the world.” Has anyone persuaded Alexandria, LA sense when we were selling large defective Americans to do otherwise? We are a democ- logs; it makes no sense in measuring our sec- racy with a robust economy. If Americans The March 2005 issue on intensive for- ond-growth logs of today. The rest of the wish to change that, let them, but I think est management for wood fiber is the corpo- world is on cubic or better metric log scales; Moore should be careful what she wishes for. rate bottom line model. This is the share- they are straightforward and directly compa- Finally, Moore states “that foresters are holder model, and in certain forest types rable. The Scribner scale that was developed confounded when their work is challenged calls primarily for clearcutting. It is, in fact, 150 years ago is not comparable to anything. with a different vision of the forest.” I dis- the same as big agriculture. Scribner inaccurately and inconsis- agree. We are not confounded; we are mor- In my view, better forestry is best on tently only accounts for 20–30% of the ally outraged by the demonstrably inaccu- smaller ownerships where the bottom line is product that comes out of small logs. The rate claims that people, such as she and not wood fiber alone, but is geared to a variety Scribner scale allows for a knowledgeable Willer, have so often made. of silvicultural treatments. All influenced by buyer to take unfair advantage of a less than Timothy La Farge existing conditions such as slope etc. Other knowledgeable seller. San Francisco, CA values can be given due consideration as one Alan J. Thayer result. It means, as a tradeoff, less net revenue. Vancouver, WA I was very surprised to learn from Fred- It becomes a philosophical question as to erick L. Kirschenmann (p. 88, Mar. 2005) whether the fiber production-profit strategy is Correction that “fossil fuel. . . has now been depleted.” best in the long run or is in accordance with In “Lessons from the October 2003 The US Department of Energy labels coal, Natural Law. What is Natural Law? That is the Wildfires in Southern California” by Keeley et oil, and natural gas as fossil fuels. Even the reason it is a philosophical question, i.e., the al. (Oct./Nov. 2004), Figure 2 was mistakenly 1972 Club of Rome’s study “Limits to drive for production alone versus being conser- printed without its color key. The correct fig- Growth” in 1972 predicted a 111-year sup- vative. Intensive management for fiber is not ure and legend are reprinted below. ply of coal even assuming that consumption conservative in nature, but is akin to exploita- grew at an exponential rate. And though we tion. Repeated shorter rotations on the same passed their estimated 31-year static index soils results in long-term reduction in the or- for petroleum last year, I am still buying gas- ganic component. Intensive management uti- ABSTRACT oline made from crude oil that has averaged lizing selective prescriptions is likely to be more in the $10–20 per barrel range for the last 50 compatible long-term, where selection is pos- years when the rate of inflation is accounted sible. This is even possible here in the Douglas- for over that time period. The present real fir region, but is not done on large ownerships price is even lower than it was during the due to cost. “energy crisis” of 1973 and the spikes in the Societal or business focus on the bot- early 1980s. This kind of exaggeration tom line has its place, but is too dominant sounds like press releases from some envi- overall. Outsourcing is just one result of this ronmental group and inclines me to take short-sighted ethic. many of Kirschenmann’s other statements H.E. Hays with a grain of salt. If this article was peer Bainbridge Island, WA reviewed then I would suggest the reviewers need to review a good economics text such as I attended the January 2005 Portland, “Economics, Principles and Policy” by Wil- Oregon Symposia on Intensive Forest Man- liam J. Baumol and Alan S. Blinder. Some agement Potential (IFMP) in the Pacific places to start would be p. 471 of the book or Northwest. I like the articles and the format the websites of the Department of Energy or the Journal of Forestry used to revisit IMFP. Figure 2. Fuel mosaics within the perimeters the Department of Commerce. Another I was Crown Zellerbachs (CZ) Re- of the 2003 fires in San Diego County, Cal- source I found interesting is the report on source Manager until 1985, and for the last ifornia, which demonstrate that the 2003 the history of crude oil prices at www.wtrg 20 years I have been intensively managing fires burned through a variety of fuel ages. .com/prices.htm. Based on my limited my own tree farms in Oregon and Washing- Three fire perimeters shown are, from north knowledge of the subject, it appears that po- ton. I am a member of Oregon Small Wood- to south: the Paradise, Cedar, and Otay litical upheaval, wars, and economic lands and Washington Farm Forestry. Fires (data from frap.cdf.ca.gov).

162 Journal of Forestry • June 2005