‘We get one little fire out there again and we have to work out there among those dead trees. They don’t call ‘em widow-makers for nothing. So I’d like to see them all taken down and re-vegged. Take all the trees out of there while there’s a value on them.’
~ Jeff Michael, chief of the Lake Valley Fire Protection District
‘The thing that the industry wants more than anything is the big trees because they’re the most economically valuable to them, and that’s the last thing to take. The large trees are ecologically critical to leave right there.’
~ Craig Thomas, Executive Director of the Sierra Forest Legacy
Since firefighters extinguished the last flames of the Angora fire on July 2, the future of the blackened forest has been a topic of controversy. The Forest Service has already begun efforts to stabilize the loose soils of the burned area and remove any dead trees that could fall on structures, roads, or trails. Now they’re wondering what to do with the acres of scorched trees that aren’t standing right next to human property. The trees could pose a fire and safety hazard to the communities nearby and, if sold to a timber operator, could bring dollars to the Forest Service; but conservationists worry that post-fire logging will disrupt the natural recovery of the Angora terrain.
For many years, post-fire logging – commonly known as ‘salvage logging’ – has been the go-to method for treating burned landscapes in the western United States. In forests managed with timber production in mind, the practice is considered sound agriculture. ‘You treat [a burned forest] like you treat a garden,’ said Hugh Safford, regional ecologist for the Pacific Southwest branch of the Forest Service, ‘You could let it fill with weeds and we know what would happen.’
Post-fire logging has also been used to prevent singed, weakened trees from toppling on fire staff or timber hands working in the forest, and to protect the next crop of timber from fire. Dead trees can act as fuel which, when ignited, leads to fires more likely to destroy any re-growth in the area. Finally, post-fire logging can direct money to local industry. The trees may be black on the outside, but they can still contain valuable board-feet of timber.
However, in the Lake Tahoe basin, where forests aren’t managed commercially and the nearest timber mill is 100 miles away, few of these factors come into play. ‘If your objective is to raise how many board-feet in 60 or 70 years, [post-fire logging] is probably what you’re going to do,’ said Rex Norman, spokesman for the Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit, ‘But we’re not looking at [the Angora area] from … a ‘booster-your-timber-production’ point of view like another national forest might.’
In the Angora fire terrain, the decision to log the burned trees would be based on a different set of priorities. All of the burned acreage lies within the wildland urban interface (WUI) – the roughly one-and-half mile-wide zone where human habitation meets undeveloped forest. As a result, Forest Service regulations require the Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit (LTBMU) to keep fuel loads lower, and manage the woods for a greater human presence.
The Sierra Nevada Forest Plan is the legal framework for managing Sierra forests. It mandates that there should be no more than two standing dead trees in each acre of WUI, and that fallen woody debris and other fuel in the WUI must be reduced to keep average flame lengths below six feet. But according to LTBMU forester and vegetation planner Duncan Leao, human traffic is a factor as well since the area was popular for recreation before it burned.
‘Let’s say ten years down the road there are a lot of heavy, downed trees … jack-strawed on the ground,’ Leao said, ‘That becomes a fuels problem and a safety problem. Let’s say if children were playing around in there.’ He explained that downed logs can also cause more destructive fires in the future, and make it difficult for hand-crews to reach the fire-line.
‘The fact that [the Angora Fire happened] within the wildland urban interface really changes the basic equation,’ said Safford, the Forest Service ecologist. He said most controversies over post-fire logging occur in portions of national forests far from communities where the landscape can more safely be left to regenerate on its own terms.
Salt in the wound?
WUI or no WUI, local conservationists are concerned that post-fire logging in the Angora area will remove too many large trees and disturb the natural regeneration already taking place.
‘I think it’s important that the people in the Lake Tahoe basin understand the negative impacts of salvage logging,’ said Craig Thomas, executive director of the Sierra Forest Legacy, a coalition of 100 environmental groups organized to protect and restore Sierra forests, ‘It takes a while for the public to understand that burned trees aren’t trash and that they are ecologically incredibly important.’
According to Thomas, certain species favor recently burned terrain. For example, black-backed woodpeckers forage for insects in fire-killed trees and are often associated with freshly burned areas. The trees themselves also play an important ecological role in the future of the forest. They provide habitat and contribute to soil formation as they decompose.
‘[Big trees] are the most ecologically important and critical thing to keep there because you won’t see them again for another 150 to 200 years,’ Thomas said, ‘This is where we always run into loggerheads with the industry because they want those trees more than anything else.’
Post-fire logging could affect broader forest habitat as well. By clearing established vegetation and returning nutrients to the soil, fire opens up new terrain for vegetation and animals, effectively resetting the forest to an ‘early-seral’ state which – in addition to areas of old, large trees – is one of the rarest habitats in the Tahoe Basin. According to Thomas, logging equipment and activity have the potential to disrupt that re-growth.
‘Salvage logging destroys diversity that shows up very quickly when these areas are regenerating on their own,’ he said.
A bridge between forests and funds
The Forest Service often contracts with private timber operators to defray the costs of forest management, and operations in the Angora area will potentially be no different. If the Forest Service decides to go ahead with post-fire logging, the contract could be a simple sale of the dead trees or could include stipulations that require the buyer to clear brush, small trees, or other fuels from the area. The Forest Service would use any proceeds from the sale for further fuel removal, road maintenance, and restoration activities.
Dave Marlow, LTBMU Fire and fuels staff officer, stated that there are ‘some economics’ to post-fire rehabilitation. ‘We’d like to have it pay for itself,’ he said.
However, Thomas worries that the possibility of using larger, more valuable trees to pay for the removal of smaller, less valuable trees and brush will cause ecological damage.
‘I think there’s a tremendous risk,’ Thomas said, ‘What [the Forest Service] generally does is cut the big ones to pay for the removal of the little ones, and that’s where we’re going to run into a train wreck.’
Sierra Pacific Industries, the largest timber company in California, has been aware of the burned trees on the Angora terrain since not long after the fire. A representative from the company toured the burned area on July 9.
‘We’ve already looked at [the dead timber]. We’re interested in trying to purchase that if it’s made available,’ said Mark Pawlicki, Sierra Pacific’s director of government affairs. ‘We are definitely interested.’
If post-fire logging does occur, it will make the most sense to do it quickly. Within a year the trees in the stand will begin to rot and crack, becoming useless for timber. According to Leao, the LTBMU forester, trees smaller than 15 inches in diameter at breast height could become worthless by next spring, and within three years the stand as a whole will begin to lose its monetary value. Pawlicki described a tighter time scale.
‘You want to be able to move that timber off this year to get it before it decays,’ Pawlicki said.
But as yet, Forest Service staff aren’t sure when the prescription for the future of the Angora terrain will be finalized. Post-fire logging is just one of a number of tools the Forest Service will consider using to manage the burned forest, and a National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA) review process and public comment period will occur before any long-term plans are put into action.
‘Even though it’s in the WUI we want to do the right thing …We’re really concerned about ecological processes,’ Safford said, ‘Everything that we do in our daily lives is a compromise, and this is going to be the same way.’
How the Forest Service hires the private industry
The Forest Service uses two basic types of contracts when it works with private industry to manage national forestland.
Service Contract: This is the simplest form of agreement. Under a service contract the Forest Service pays a contractor to perform the work. The contractor could consist of a logging crew thinning a section of woods and hauling the timber to a mill, or even a single worker with a masticator reducing the fuel load in a section of forest. The Forest Service uses service contracts when there’s not much value to be derived from the work being done.
‘If all the trees in an area are smaller than 10 inches there’s really no value there. So you’re just going to pay (the contractor),’ said Tahoe National Forest supervisor, Steve Eubanks.
Timber Sale: At its most basic, this is just what it sounds like. The Forest Service sells the trees to a timber operator who then removes the timber and takes it to a mill. However, the Forest Service can add stipulations to the sale and mix service work into the contract. For example, a contractor might be required to remove smaller, less valuable, trees, or to remove brush and woody debris.
According to Eubanks tree values vary by species but, in rough terms, a tree ten inches in diameter at breast height would be worth $5 to $10. By contrast, a tree with a diameter of 29 inches could sell for between $300 and $500.
In Tahoe National Forest, where fuel treatments cost between $500 and $1,000 dollars per acre, the sale of a few large trees can pay for the whole sum. Due to environmental regulations, fuel treatments in the Tahoe Basin tend to be $500 more expensive.
Regulations prevent the Forest Service from cutting living trees larger than 29.9 inches in diameter at breast height.
