Sierra Nevada climate changes feed monster, forest-devouring fires

[Barrett808]

Sierra Nevada climate changes feed monster, forest-devouring fires
By Tom Knudson, [e-mail]
Published: Sunday, Nov. 30, 2008 | Page 1A

Driving home from Lake Tahoe, Leah Wills watched the column of ash-gray smoke from the Moonlight fire grow and grow – until finally she was under it.

Overhead, the sky that September afternoon in 2007 turned eerie pink. Orange-red flecks of burning bark streaked like missiles through the air. And the smoke – eye-watering and acrid – was inescapable.

"It was like a nuclear cloud," said Wills, 59, a policy analyst for the Plumas County Flood Control District who lives near the tiny hamlet of Genesee. "I've been to Denali and Kilimanjaro. I grew up with tornadoes. I've seen some big things. I never saw anything that big in my life."

Wildfire has marched across the West for centuries. But no longer are major conflagrations fueled simply by heavy brush and timber. Now climate change is stoking the flames higher and hotter, too.

...

"I don't envision sand dunes like the Sahara," said Mike Yost, a retired forestry professor from Taylorsville. "But I can envision places where there aren't going to be forests again in many human lifetimes and in some places, maybe never."

(more)

http://www.sacbee.com/101/story/1436736.html

[FirstLight]

1. I live in Tahoe...

I has rained maybe 3 times since Spring... and then it waxs just "spitting" not a real downpour...

There "should" be about 2 feet or more of snow on the ground... and it was 58 today
Mt Tallac in May "should" be still mostly white...for the last 2 years, it has been bare like the end of summer/fall

I can see the efects of climate change right here in my little ecosystem over the past decade, and it ain't pretty

[mike_c]

2. drought and periodic sustained high temperatures have always been a factor...

...in western forest dynamics. I've seen fire scarring in redwood forest canopies at 80 meters and higher-- the historical record of crown fires in some of the most mesic forests in North America. It has happened before. It will happen again, but this time the climate shift will likely be more prolonged and will lead to significant changes in forest range and composition.

But the main point I wanted to make is that while the mean fire conditions are shifting, the climatic portion of those conditions is likely shifting within the range of historical variation. I don't mean to suggest that isn't significant-- it certainly is-- but rather that western forests are already capable of adapting to those changes, albeit with some major impacts, especially at the extremes of ecological range and such.

The real problem is that this is occurring within the context of a century of poorly informed fire management. In a decade when western forests are approaching tinderbox drought and heat, they're also filled with one hundred year's worth of fuel, or at least the dense understory legacy of fairly recent fire suppression. THAT is the greatest part of the problem, IMO.

Heat and drought come and go. Long term climate shifts in favor of hotter, drier conditions will undoubtedly change western forests, but the dynamics of that change are to some degree already built into those forests' ecology. Fire is the real BIG PROBLEM, not just because of the climate shift, but because of the mistakes we've made in the past.

The big question we're facing now is whether a more rational fire management regime from an historical perspective is the right fire management regime for the future, when conditions are changing.

[Barrett808]

3. 60 Minutes: The Age Of Mega-Fires

The Age Of Mega-Fires
Expert: Warming Climate Fueling Mega-Fires
Dec. 30, 2007

This past fall, wildfires ripped through Southern California, burning more than 500,000 acres of trees, destroying over 2,000 homes, and claiming nine lives. Scientists now say we should brace ourselves for more and more of these fires in the coming years, because there's been an enormous change in Western fires. In truth, we've never seen anything like them in recorded history.

It appears we're living in a new age of mega-fires -- forest infernos ten times bigger than the fires we're used to seeing.

To find out why it's happening, 60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley went out on the fire line this summer to see the burning of the American West.

(more)

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/10/18/60minutes/main3380176.shtml