The biggest threat to our home here in the Sequoia National Forest is a forest fire. I post about my property clearing "exercise" on occasion. My work continues on these five acres. We have been lucky this season. We got through one more season it would appear. We are not threatened here by the October Santa Anas like southern California is. July and August heat are our biggest enemies.
Not to be overly grim, just to be realistic about our circumstances, the fire season ending for us about now puts us a season closer. Forestry people here continue to say "It's not a matter of if but when." I do not let this fact cause me fear and dread. I use the information to take some control over our lives by doing things such as brush clearing. I have used it to face another of my big fears - chainsaws. I had not touched on until this past February when I received it for my birthday. This is a big step for a person who grew up in the era of the movies "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre." Some of you know what I am talking about. ;)
This topic is obviously on my mind because a good friend lost her house on Lake Arrowhead yesterday. Her family is safe and had about ninety minutes to evacuate. She has been spear-heading our high school reunion planning and that reunion happens in about ten days. She actually put the table decorations for the reunion in her car but lamented that she forgot her reunion dress. She was obviously the right person to take charge of the reunion for both her planning abilities and her attitude.
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The circumstances in the Los Angeles basin and mountains are far different than we will ever face here, but we do share something in common: the health of our forests is a big part of what puts us at risk.
All of the dead and dying pine trees in the Lake Arrowhead area have made the forest notorious among biologists. The smog has attacked the immune systems of the trees leaving them susceptible to the pine beetle. Sequoia National Forest has the same problem but to a lesser degree. We have smog, but the smog here has not been as bad for as long as it has been in the Arrowhead area. Our trees are dying too but at a slower rate.
There is nothing like seeing the effects of smog and beetles in first hand to convince you that there is a serious problem. But if you haven't been to these forests, the pictures here will give you some idea.
The picture above is a typical sight in the Sequoia National Forest. I did not have to seek these trees out. I could have taken a picture like this in a whole lot of places. This picture just happened to be convenient. It required only jumping out of the car. Notice the cluster of dead trees. If you have built fires in fireplaces, woodstoves, or at a camp, you probably know that dry wood burns a lot faster than green wood. Green wood is the wood from a tree that hasn't been dead for a long time. It is harder to catch on fire and burns more slowing. When a tree dies and sits for a season or more in the forest, it will catch fire quickly in a forest fire, will burn hot, and catch the living trees on fire. All of this seasoned fuel will make a fire here impossible to fight.
But the story is really worse than this because most of the areas that tourists see here are kept relatively clear. My dad and I went on an old logging road to capture some cow pictures and we got more than we bargained for. The amount of dead wood in this area (Horse Meadow near The Trail of a Hundred Giants in Giant Sequoia National Monument) is astounding.
I took a few pictures but found it hard to capture the level of devastation on camera.
A fire came close to the historic Trail of a Hundred Giants about five years ago and firefighters made heroic efforts to save it. Good thing too. When a fire does come through this area it will not be a small one.
Godspeed everyone.
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Here's a picture from Dona:
