Morning Poll: Are Hippies to Blame for Wallow Fire?

• at this point I wouldn't be against them cutting fire breaks into the forests to stop the huge monster fires from happening. The Cave Creek Complex fire was a huge one, and you can blame anti-hippy idiots for that fire.

• BTW I have been to many "Pristine forests" and see all the problems. What I want to know is since all the trees are of uniform size (like say out by Happy Jack) what happened to the old growth trees ? Can I take a wild guess?

• it's dry because ranchers brought in many plants to feed their cattle that weren't native to AZ so when there were droughts they dried up and burnt at a much hotter temperature then the native plants do.

• you are forgetting about the invasive species that were brought into AZ by greedy ranchers.

• correct, but the native cultures kept the understory in check, which kept the trees from growing too close together. which is the whole point.

• they survived by the fact that the native cultures usually burnt the undergrowth for many reasons, but they kept the forest healthy by allowing the mature "old growth" trees to survive while clearing out the smaller trees. When the mature trees were dying out they would move to another section and do the same thing, thus keeping the forest uncluttered.

• Maybe you should take a fucking look at the Bradshaw Mountains and notice that they don't have many trees on them. Why? copper mines used all available timber in the 1800s  and burnt it to run the smelters. I know I am late on this poll, but it's really getting old when brain dead republicans try to blame environmentalists for problems like the ones in AZ. They were created by greedy people, not by the few people that care about healthy forests.

• It sounds like your the brain dead person living somewhere in a dirty city!

• Maybe you should get informed. Arizona is not a clear cut logging state because of the arid climate. By not logging and thinning and grazing cattle and sheep, it's been let to build and build with brush and thickets to the point that the fuel load was as the USFS put it was ready for the perfect fire storm. People like you don't live in these areas and have unrealistic views of what the forest should be. To proove you wrong. Alpine and Nutrioso, AZ have urban interface thinning around their towns and that is what saved those towns because it made a devistating crown fire drop to the ground where it could be fought. Maybe you should study what a healthy forest is before you cast blame on the residents of towns in Arizona because no one loves there forest more than them but they are for managing a good balance. I don't think you have a major forest fire scar in your back yard I'm sure in a city somewhere.

• If anyone is to blame it's the old policies of the Forest Service that allowed 100 years of growth without low intensity fires to burn off the underbrush. Zero tolerance policy for fires is a big factor in the problem of high intensity fires we now face. Hippies got nothin' to do with that!

• I think the rain clouds were blowing in from the south and the nativists stopped them at the border.

• The undergrowth issue tends to be a red herring. With a really overgrown, degraded forest ecosystem, there s not enough sunlight getting through the canopy to support much understory, and the canopy intercepts much of the rain and snowfall as well.  It's not the undergrowth in one of these forest fires that is the problem, because their is little or no undergrowth; the problem is that the trees are ailing, and are so close together that once the fire gets up into the canopy the whole mess burns to the ground. You actually WANT undergrowth in a healthy forest - the species diversity is a big part of what makes it healthy.

• view photos of the Wallow fire and you will see that there is little or no brush, and that the trees are close enough together that they have created continuous canopy, shutting out much of the sunlight to the ground below. Which is a big reason why there is little or no brush. You will also notice that many of the trees are spindly in their growth habit, the result of too many trees to close together in competition for water and soil nutrients. This is a degraded ecosystem. Very poor species diversity, and little carrying capacity for deer and other wildlife (unless your a frigging giraffe, pine trees don't do you much good for food - most animals need vegetation closer to the ground for food and cover.) Those who call this a "pristine forest" have no idea what healthy forest looks ik http://wildfiretoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/Wallow-fire-6-7-2011.jpg

• I think that the hippies caused the drought because rain clouds hate the smell of Pachouli and the sound of drum circles.

• True up to a point. Why is the brush dry? Once forests get too much canopy, the local hydrology changes, and not in a good way. The trees need to be thinned too, but with a preference exercised for culling the smaller, younger trees.

• Exactly. Tree density in these forests was often less than twenty per acre. Fires burned in these areas, frequently deliberately set by indigenous peoples, every 2 to 15 years. The fires, because they were mostly grass and brush fires, took out seedling trees, not the old growth. These fires were essential to keeping forest ecosystems healthy. Unfortunately, greatly increased tree density now means that a fire will take out ALL of the vegetation, and the excessive heat will likely form a surface crust that tends to repel water and discourage new growth. So the best approach to begin with is to mechanically mimic some of what nature would have done, thinning with a focus on younger, smaller trees that are not attractive to the timber industry. Those trees would, however, produce fuel via gasification, and yield biochar for agriculture as a byproduct. Once the forests are adequately thinned, fire will be restorative, not detrimental.

• Yeah just blame the hippies, they are the perfect scapegoats. I have long hair, I'm against unjustified wars, the legalization of marijuana, but I have never  set a forest  fire to keep loggers out. I'm surprised the blame is not on illegal aliens, the Taliban, or socialism. I have backpaked and camped all over the the US and have always put out campfires anytime the sight was unattended. The problem is lack of common sense from campers, not hippies, loggers, environmentalists, illegal aliens, muslims, or  socialists

• It's asinine to blame environmentalists for wild fires. The logging company started that disinformation so they could plunder our forests. Would you start a fire with a big old tree or would you look for old, dry dead wood? It's the small dry brush, the small trees and all the dead wood that needs to be cleared that cause a fire danger. The old growth trees with their large root system keep water in the forest and prevent forest fires. Not paying to maintain our forests and remover the dry stuff is what created the hazard in the first place. If the government would have paid WPA style workers to do controlled burns and clear the dry stuff, we wouldn't have fires and we could have put some people to work doing something valuable to society. Republicans who don't think forward to the next generation and spend money on forest management and Republicans who back the logging industry are the cause of these fires.

• Logging does not remove the underbrush, which is the fuel for these fires.  They only remove the large trees that are the least likely to fuel a fire. 

• So someone explain to me how these poor forests existed for 1000s of years before the timber industry came in and 'saved them'? Someone else explain to me how these forests survived for 1000s of years with all this undergrowth that no one wants to clear out? The timber industry wants to save one thing: Money. They would cut corners and screw over people like the copper industry does, the oil, natural gas, prison industry, etc. It is all about profit, not our precious forests. Environmentalists are supposed to be rooted in science. But they've taken an emotional stance that gets them in some interesting corners. Hopefully they can learn and change their strict positions. And I would trust them to do this before I'd trust the timber industry to be honest. We need people to clear out the old growth- but not cut down living trees. Thus, when a fire does come through, it burns up the grasses and low growth and leaves the trees. A healthy turn over in a healthy eco system. I wouldn't trust a timber company if they gave me their balls in a glass container as insurance before they touched the forest. Not without a strong federal government oversight- something we sorely lack right now.

• Yeah, but you can't expect the brain dead people in Az. to actually fault their corporate masters.

• This has too be the biggest pile of shit I've ever heard. The forests are overgrown and unhealthy because of the original crappy logging practices of 100 years. Clear cutting, for one, made everything grow in again at the same height, but very thick, so it all goes up at once. Also, they took out all of the choice 'old growth' that would survive this fire if the forests were growing the way they are supposed to. This 'blame the hippies' shit is getting old. @Mistalee: Yeah, we've fucked up a natural balance here, and people should see this as an example of what we can do if we don't curb out pollution before it gets out of control... While global warming might not be as extreme as some think, there is no harm to curbing things before they get too bad. <b><i>"Maybe you should get informed. Arizona is not a clear cut logging state because of the arid climate."</b></i> Maybe YOU should "get informed". Clear cutting USED to happen in Northern Arizona, and it resulted in very uniform growth. They don't have 200-300 year old trees that will weather the fire while the undergrowth burns down. It was ruined back in the early 20th century by clear cutting, and they now have the forest that reflects it. It's environmental pressure that stopped this practice. <b><i>"Maybe you should study what a healthy forest is before you cast blame on the residents of towns in Arizona because no one loves there forest more than them but they are for managing a good balance."</b></i> I never blamed the residents, you illiterate troll. I blamed irresponsible logging and I blamed the people who wanted to put all of the blame on environmental groups, but not the residents. Jesus, when they created 'dumb', they had you in mind. <b><i>"People like you don't live in these areas and have unrealistic views of what the forest should be."</b></i> I lived in Flagstaff for 5 years, and 1 year of that was 3 miles south of town, renting a trailer on some land IN THE FOREST. <b><i>" I don't think you have a major forest fire scar in your back yard I'm sure in a city somewhere."</b></i> I don't, and I currently do. I live in Salt Lake, and last summer we had a wildfire that came within about 100 yardas of taking out a rural suburb here... I believe a few houses actually were lost. This one was started because some rocket scientist decided the local National Guard base should have live-fire machine gun exercises on a 100 degree day, but I'm sure if given the chance, the very people mentioned in this story would try to blame it on the fucking tree huggers. I have friends that live there and almost lost their houses. Have a nice night and fuck you very much. I notice you don't even have the balls to post under a real name, instead you are one of the brave 'Anonymous' people with the hit and run tactics.

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