Light/Breezes

Light/Breezes
SUNRISE AT DEATH VALLEY-Photo by Tom Cochrun
Showing posts with label forest clean up. Show all posts
Showing posts with label forest clean up. Show all posts

Tuesday, January 17, 2012

A COMBUSTIBLE DEBATE

WHAT ABOUT THE FOREST?
Cambria and this area of the Central Coast
has been recently treated to a sometimes loud and
an animated debate about the clearing of a
a firebreak.  There are differing ideas about
how best to do that.  This post
raises the issue only as a point of context.
I wonder why some of our Monterey Pine forest
is allowed to become a kind of tinder box?
A recent hike across the Fiscalini Ranch Preserve
and into a portion of the forest
revealed what, to this blogger, looked like a dangerous situation.
There are plenty more situations like those captured in these few frames.  A lot of downed branches, limbs and even trees-
simply left to age, dry and become potential kindling.
I know experts who argue that it is best
to leave the forests untouched and natural.  A strain of
naturalist or environmentalist will agree but others differ.
It seems common sense alone would lead to know that
less debris like this, kindling, makes for a reduced fire hazard.  Chumash and Salinan tribes practiced controlled
burns to preen the wilderness and eliminate the potential for greater danger.  It also allowed for healthy soil and native
plant growth.

As I hike the area, I need to suppress the urge to 
clean up the forest floor.
Maybe some of the local hobbits will carry away
the debris and use it in their fireplaces!
In the meantime I wonder why there is such a 
difference of opinion.
See you down the trail.