Fire and grass

[Dave]

So on July 17 2024 everything on my place except the house and the irrigated ground burned. So in 2025 I had great grass. No fences so the grass didn't get grazed and all the went to seed. I have new fences now and am looking forward to plenty of grass in 2026. All the water using sage brush and juniper is gone. I know from reading that historically there wasn't the sage brush and juniper and there was great grass here. Then in the early 1900's over grazing occurred. Prior to that natural wildfires burned the area which controlled the brush species. The combination of over grazing and fire control allowed for sage and juniper to thrive. So now with a natural fire and terribly poor fire management by some federal employees there is nearly 500,000 acres growing better grass. The results make me wonder why we don't have more controlled burns.

 

[Silver]

We have proven over and over the benefits of Rx burns up here. Can’t get it through the heads of the statutory decision makers. They only see risk and their tenures tend to be short so they refuse to look beyond their short period of service. I think they can’t stand the element of risk and how it may affect their job and pension. So it is better for them to do nothing and kick the can down the road.

 

[chevytaHOE5674]

Frequent low intensity Rx burns are great for lots of ecosystems but the powers to be prefer to suppress them typically to mitigate precieved risk. In doing so a build up of fuel happens, which then primes the pump for intense often times un-controllable devistating fires to happen.

More frequent low intensity fires are often the answer.

 

[RDFF]

Prescribed grazing (MIG, Rotational Grazing, etc.) can accomplish much along these lines as well, but particularly in the rougher, more sparsely vegetated lands of the west (vs. here in the upper Midwest historically prairie/woodlands), the animal stocking density simply can't be as heavy (less production), and therefore the impact will also be "less"... so regular burning of the residues (including then, the sage/juniper) becomes "more" important to overall management. My neighbor uses "prescribed burning" to manage woody species on his CRP, and the DNR uses it and cutting/mulching to try to control woody species on their land here as well. In both cases, the woody species have become worse/more dense, than where I'm grazing right alongside of them, without any burning at all. They're basically just pissing them off, and they come back more intensely than they were before.

 

[Dave]

I had some old growth sage brush which was over 6 inches in the stump and 8 feet tall. B and I had discussed a controlled burn. But it is right next to BLM and I didn't want to end up like the Hammonds. I know some people spray it but that ain't cheap with the number of acres. And success is limited. Interesting one of the neighbors had done some controlled burning in 2022. The big 2024 fire got to the edge of his controlled burn stopped and went around

 

[Brute 23]

The reality is people dont want to rest or defer the land before and after the burn.

Burning with out proper management before and after will not do a lot of good.

 

[Mark Reynolds]

Thoughts, opinions, and perceived notions are rampant about fire. It can be a great tool when used properly. It is too little understood. Smokey did too good of a job! When an area has had fire supressed from it for too long of a period, realizing that a mistake was made and simply throwing fire back into the mix isn't that simple. Reintroduction often ends up being more destructive than the fire supression was, and then those trying to reintroduce it get to say "I told you so". What isn't readily recognized either, is that this catastrophic reintroduction almost has to occur in order to properly reset the system. There are 'substitutes' such as mowing, herbicides and grazing, but these 'substitutes' are just that and don't really do quite the same thing. Prescribed fire that is applied too frequently is as destructive as no fire as well. "Complete" prescribed burns are not ecosystem friendly either. Depending on where the prescribed fire, or any fire is, greatly affects what kind of prescribed fire is needed/should be used/is healthy. Most prescribed fire burns in a mosaic pattern leaving parches completely unburned. These are needed and have reasons that they won't burn as well as reasons they shouldn't be burned. I watched a fire crew learn this lesson one time with amusement as they were conducting a preventative prescribed burn. They dropped the potassium permanganate on an unburned area 3 times over a 2 day period (within a prescribed burn) before they decided that the mosaic was ok to leave (unburned patches). The local wildlife absolutely loved the result with the unburned mosaic pattern. The initial plan was to uniformly burn the area for wildlife. Come to find out by observing the area for a time after the burn, the wildlife prefered the mosaic pattern opposed to the complete burn, with a returning population post fire that was about 3.5 X of what was expected with a uniform burn.

 

[RDFF]

Yeah, it probably depends on what "success" on the landscape looks like to the individual too. Are you wanting "optimal grazing", or are you wanting wildlife habitat? A "mosaic" would certainly be beneficial to the wildlife population, but might not get you "optimal grazing per acre". That's one reason that I'm saying to my DNR partners, "I need to know what YOUR goals are, if I'm going to be successful at grazing YOUR property... what I might want to see there could be quite different than what YOU want to see there... and I can't achieve YOUR goal, without understanding what it is that you see as "success".

Pretty important. And we have to remember that if grazing "public lands", it's THEY'RE land, not ours. THEY get to decide then what they want it to look like... and their goals may have absolutely nothing to do with optimizing OUR profit.

 

[Silver]

When we burn here we look to make low intensity fires that creep through the aspen and clear out the under brush while leaving the mature aspen to provide a canopy. Fires that are too hot damage soil and kill the good trees.it's really not rocket surgery, we’d been doing it successfully for generations, and the natives before us did as well prior to the bureaucrats, politicians , and educated idiots putting a stop to it.

 

[RDFF]

When we burn here we look to make low intensity fires that creep through the aspen and clear out the under brush while leaving the mature aspen to provide a canopy. Fires that are too hot damage soil and kill the good trees.it's really not rocket surgery, we’d been doing it successfully for generations, and the natives before us did as well prior to the bureaucrats, politicians , and educated idiots putting a stop to it.

My Dad used to talk about how it was common around here too, to burn the leaves off in the woods after they'd fallen in the woods... keeping the mature trees unharmed. That said, I have never seen it done around here. And I'm 68 now! (How'd THAT happen???).

 

[sgreear]

As a kid I lived on a big hill that never got mowed and lots of broom sage. The neighbor boy was setting off those things we called spinners. It was lots of fun untill we saw smoke and the hill side was on fire. We all were devistated but we finally got it out out. The hillside was black. The next spring no sage was there and the grass was noticeably greener and thicker. I was amazed.

 

[Dave]

The big junipers don't burn well mainly because there is nothing under them to burn. So on day 3 of the fire I watched the fire circle around and come down to the road. There is about 10 -20 acres of big junipers across the road from my driveway. I watched as those brilliant federal fire fighters attempted 3 times to back fire those big junipers. It is nothing but big junipers and rock. It didn't burn despite their best efforts.

One of the things around here is you can see the benefits from fire just driving down the road, Areas where it hasn't burned in years will have lots of sage and minimal grass. Areas which burned even 10 - 20 years ago have very little sage and lots of grass.

 

[Brute 23]

The frequency of burns depends a lot on your annual rainfall. In dry areas to the west it may only take a 1 in 10 year burn where as on the coast it may be 1 in 2 or 3 years.

 

[Silver]

This pic was taken a few months after a good burn. It should have been burnt again 2 years later but permits no longer issued.

 

[Brute 23]

There are other benefits like tick control that come from fire, also.

 

[Mark Reynolds]

We keep talking about individual, specific benefits that help the ecosystem, which is good, even very good. I'll take it a step or two even further. It's not only just good for the ecosystem, but the ecosystem is dependent upon fire. And do I dare say that fire is part of the ecosystem itself, and without it, it's not the same ecosystem?

 

[kenny thomas]

We keep talking about individual, specific benefits that help the ecosystem, which is good, even very good. I'll take it a step or two even further. It's not only just good for the ecosystem, but the ecosystem is dependent upon fire. And do I dare say that fire is part of the ecosystem itself, and without it, it's not the same ecosystem?

I won't totally disagree with this but its lots different for grass than for hardwood timber. USFS is burning hardwood timber in the east and ruining lots of it. Just like the juniper and sagebrush in the west it kills them but there is no reason to kill trees in the mountains of the east.
USFS in my area burns ONLY because its a way for them to get money in their budget. Hurricane Helene damaged a lot of timber in the mountains. Just uprooted it. Some expect the USFS will not let it be salvaged but then in a few years will burn thousands off acres to lower the fuel load. We as taxpayers will not only loose the value of the trees but will pay a big price to burn them.

 

[Dave]

One of the biggest problem is keeping your controlled burn on the property which you plan to burn. The fire jumps your property line and your neighbor can sue. If your neighbor happens to be the government you could end up in prison. That is probably the biggest reason that people are not doing prescribed burns in this part of the world.
Interesting how a private citizen doing a controlled burn that jumps a line and burns a few acres of government land gets in huge trouble. Yet government employees take control of fighting a wild fire make huge mistakes which cause thousands of acres of private land to burn, well they were just doing their job.

 

[Mrcopier]

I won't totally disagree with this but its lots different for grass than for hardwood timber. USFS is burning hardwood timber in the east and ruining lots of it. Just like the juniper and sagebrush in the west it kills them but there is no reason to kill trees in the mountains of the east.
USFS in my area burns ONLY because its a way for them to get money in their budget. Hurricane Helene damaged a lot of timber in the mountains. Just uprooted it. Some expect the USFS will not let it be salvaged but then in a few years will burn thousands off acres to lower the fuel load. We as taxpayers will not only loose the value of the trees but will pay a big price to burn them.

Pretty sad really

 

[Mark Reynolds]

I won't totally disagree with this but its lots different for grass than for hardwood timber. USFS is burning hardwood timber in the east and ruining lots of it. Just like the juniper and sagebrush in the west it kills them but there is no reason to kill trees in the mountains of the east.
USFS in my area burns ONLY because its a way for them to get money in their budget. Hurricane Helene damaged a lot of timber in the mountains. Just uprooted it. Some expect the USFS will not let it be salvaged but then in a few years will burn thousands off acres to lower the fuel load. We as taxpayers will not only loose the value of the trees but will pay a big price to burn them.

LOL. Maybe I have a strange sense of humor, I'm not sure. @kenny thomas, you make a good point. Not so much about salvaging the trees, although I do agree with you that the trees should be salvaged at some level, at least on National Forests that have that as part of their purpose. What I'm laughing at is you pointing out that different ecosystems operate very differently from each other and that my statement, although not necessarily intended this way, comes across almost as a blanket statement that fire is a normal, integral part of all ecosystems. You are quite correct, it is not, and within different ecosystems it is present in, it behaves and plays verry different roles from system to system.