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Strange Bedfellows Hope to Save Forests
Laurel Morales (2011-06-13)
FLAGSTAFF, AZ (knau)
Over the last decade forests
in the Southwest have seen more catastrophic fires, like the one burning
right now in Eastern Arizona. Scientists say it's a result of unhealthy
forests. A new effort aims to restore the landscape. And if it works in
Arizona, it could be used on the 180 million acres of ponderosa pine
forests across the west.
Arizona's thick overgrown,
dry forest wasn't always so vulnerable. In the 1800s there were only
about 20 trees to an acre. Fire meandered through the grass and played
its natural role in the ecosystem. Fire ecologist Mary Lata says removal
of old growth trees, intensive livestock grazing and fire suppression
changed all of that.
"Starting with Smoky Bear and
Bambi in the early part of the century we had the European view of fire
just being a bad thing so put it out," Lata says. "Starting in the early
part of the century slowly people began to realize fire has an important
role to play."
Today, firefighting and fire
prevention accounts for nearly half of the Forest Service budget. And
Lata says up until recently land management agencies could only restore
a few acres at a time.
"We have a huge landscape and
we're treating little postage stamp size chunks of land which ultimately
we go there we treat once and in some cases keep up with it but in most
cases we are falling further and further behind."
But now, the Forest Service
in Arizona has teamed up with several collaborators to find a cost
effective way to return the landscape to its original state and prevent
future catastrophic fires. It's called the Four Forest Restoration
Initiative. More than 40 unlikely bed fellows -- environmentalists,
government agencies and industry -- are working together.
"We have total agreement in
the woods," says team leader Henry Provencio. "We fall apart on process
so that's a really difficult tightrope to cross."
Provencio works for the
Forest Service in Flagstaff. Right now the groups are struggling to
develop a framework. How many trees should be cut per acre, for
instance. They're trying to do it quickly before more forests are lost
to severe wildfires. They have $38 million over 10 years to plan, survey
the land for wildlife and artifacts, and mark the trees for cutting. It
costs $1,000 to mechanically thin an acre of forest.
This is where industry comes
in. A company called Arizona Forest Restoration Products will submit a
request to cut down trees and make them into a compound called OSB. It's
used to build houses.
"It is one of the very few
products that you can make with small diameter trees, a product which
has a proven market, which has a proven profitability," says Pascal
Berlioux the CEO of Arizona Forest Restoration Products. "Therefore it
is one of the few product that has the economic capability of funding
restoration on the large scale."
In fact, the scale is huge.
We're talking millions of acres that scientists like Wally Covington say
need to be restored. Covington is the director of Northern Arizona
University's Ecological Restoration Institute.
"From northern Mexico all the
way up to British Columbia," Covington says. "So it's a 180 million acre
problem throughout the west."
So, Covington says, this
project could be a model for the rest of the country. And when the work
begins this fall, it will be the largest restoration contract ever
awarded by the National Forest Service.
© Copyright 2011, knau
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