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EASTERN OREGON
East Oregonian
Saturday, April 30, 2022
Forest’s fiery plans might fizzle out
By JAYSON JACOBY
Baker City Herald
BAKER CITY — Trevor
Lewis was almost ready to
start spreading flames when
the rain arrived.
The rain stopped but it
was supplanted by snow.
Regardless of whether the
precipitation has been liquid
or frozen, there’s simply been
too much moisture during
April for Lewis and other
U.S. Forest Service officials
to begin their ambitious plans
for prescribed burning on
parts of the Wallowa-Whit-
man National Forest.
“Right now it’s just too
wet,” Lewis said on Tuesday,
April 26.
He’s an assistant fire
management officer for the
Wallowa-Whitman’s Burnt
Powder Fire Zone, in the
fuels division.
Given ideal condi-
tions, forest managers had
hoped to light controlled
fires on several thousand
acres around the south end
of the forest, including in
the Sumpter and Whitney
valley areas and in the south-
ern Wallowas around Balm
Creek Reservoir, Lily White
and Sparta Butte.
Conditions have not been
ideal. Far closer to the oppo-
site, in fact.
But it didn’t start that way.
‘Back in prescription’
Lewis said that in early
April, with the snow line
receding and generally dry
weather persisting, a trend
that lasted much of the
winter, conditions in some
places were almost suitable
for prescribed burning.
If the rain had held off for
another three or four days,
Lewis said burning likely
would have started in a few
places.
But then one storm damp-
ened the rapidly drying
woods.
And the parade of Pacific
tempests has continued, with
relatively brief intermissions,
ever since.
Much too brief to get
forests “back in prescrip-
Jayson Jacoby/Baker City Herald, File
A La Grande Hot Shot firefighter uses a drip torch to ignite dry grass during a prescribed fire
near Phillips Reservoir on April 15, 2021. Conditions have been too wet so far this spring for
prescribed burning.
tion,” as Lewis puts it.
What he means is a piece
of ground that’s not so dry
that flames will spread too
fast or burn too hot, but also
not so soggy as to quickly
squelch the f lames. The
period when a section of
forest meets the necessary
criteria typically happens
only during spring or fall.
In some seasons it doesn’t
happen at all. And Lewis is
starting to think spring 2022
might be one of those.
Steven Cooke, Lewis’
counter par t on the
Wallowa-Whitman’s Grande
Ronde Fire Zone, which
generally coincides with the
La Grande Ranger District,
agrees.
“It’s going to be a really
short window (for prescribed
burning) if we even get one,”
Cooke said.
As of that day, the
Blue Mou nt ai n I nter-
agency Dispatch Center in
La Grande, which covers
the Wallowa-W hit man
and parts of the Umatilla
National Forest, reported no
prescribed burning projects
completed this year.
“Right now, it’s not look-
ing good for any prescribed
burning this spring,” Lewis
conifer trees sprouting fresh
green buds.
Once those buds begin to
proliferate, prescribed burn-
“RIGHT NOW IT’S NOT LOOKING
GOOD FOR ANY PRESCRIBED
BURNING THIS SPRING. WE’LL
SEE WHAT THE REST OF THE
SPRING BRINGS.”
— Trevor Lewis, assistant fire management officer,
Wallowa-Whitman National Forest
said. “We’ll see what the rest
of the spring brings.”
If it continues to bring
frequent rain and snow for
much longer, he said the
Wallowa-Whitman’s burning
“window” might well close at
least until the autumn rains
(which tend not to be as reli-
able as those of spring).
Dry days
As May progresses, fire
managers have another crite-
rion to add to their list —
energytrust.org
ing is more risky because the
flames and heat can scorch
the new growth and stunt the
tree, Lewis said.
By late May, prescribed
burning typically isn’t feasi-
ble even if the ground has
the proper moisture content.
The growth of lush new
grass — which is likely after
a prolonged period of rain —
also can stymie fire manag-
ers, since green vegetation
doesn’t burn as readily as
the desiccated mat of pine
needles and other debris that
predominates earlier in the
spring.
As of now, Lewis said, it
would likely take 10 to 14
days of dry weather to get
forests to a condition where
prescribed burning could be
effective.
But for much of April
there hasn’t been more than
a few consecutive dry days.
That’s not nearly long
enough to dry the ground,
Lewis said — especially
ground that was covered with
half a foot of soggy spring
snow.
That was the situation
with many of the places
where prescribed fires were
planned this spring, he said.
Snow, as you might
expect, poses a more formi-
dable impediment to burning
than rain does.
Rain mainly soaks into
the ground, and a couple of
sunny, warm days can pretty
much erase the effects of a
rainstorm, Lewis said.
But once the snow melts,
the ground remains about as
wet as it would be after a rain
shower, so the drying cycle is
proportionately longer.
“It just really set us back,”
Lewis said of the multi-
ple snowstorms in the Blue
Mountains during April.
He said some units near
Sparta, and a couple on the
east side of Black Mountain,
south of Phillips Reservoir,
are the most likely candidates
for potential prescribed burn-
ing this spring.
Cooke said a couple units
north of Interstate 84 at
Hilgard possibly could dry
out early enough to be burned
this spring, but the potential
effects of smoke, given the
proximity to La Grande,
could be a challenge.
A much
different spring
If all the potential burn-
ing is postponed this spring,
it wouldn’t be the first time,
Lewis said.
But this year demonstrates
how dramatically different
successive years can be.
Last spring was much more
conducive to prescribed fire.
In mid-April 2021, crews
from the Wallowa-Whitman
burned several hundred acres
of ponderosa pine forest near
Phillips Reservoir, about 17
miles southwest of Baker
City.
Although a few patches of
snow still survived in shel-
tered spots, Lewis said the
lack of spring rain, and the
ongoing effects of drought,
left the forest floor dry enough
to sustain flames.
Those blazes killed a
small percentage of pines,
and blackened the bark and
turned the green needles red
on some others.
But Wallowa-Whitman
officials, including Lewis,
who toured the burned areas
a few months later were satis-
fied with the results.
Forest managers prescribe
controlled fires for multiple
reasons and in multiple situ-
ations.
But the common goal is to
reduce the amount of combus-
tible stuff on the ground —
dead dry grass, mats of pine
needles and fallen twigs and
limbs, as well as the manmade
debris left after logging or
thinning of trees too small to
be sawed into boards.
Trimming the volume
of this material — what fire
officials simply call “fuel” —
can curb the risk of wildfires
during the summer, when
flames tend to be much more
difficult to control due to hot,
dry weather.
Forest Service officials
also say that prescribed fires
can spur the growth of native
grasses and shrubs that are
valuable food sources for
wildlife and cattle.
In general, prescribed fires
are intended to mimic fires
that used to burn relatively
frequently in areas where
ponderosa pine was the domi-
nant species — every decade
or so, according to scientists
who have studied fire scars on
old growth trees.
Some of those fires were
ignited by lightning.
Native Americans also
used prescribed fire to
partially clear the ground.