At first, it looked like a sunset… when I noticed that the sky was a rusted orange. It took only a few breaths to realize the bonfire smell was the drifting product of faraway wildfires. …In the early 1990s, I worked as a tree planter in northern Ontario. …I was driven in part by the idealistic view that planting a tree was always going to be better than not planting one. In retrospect, this wasn’t true. Forestry experts understand that a monoculture of trees — like we were planting has made wildfires more likely, and much worse. …Black spruce is often found in a mix with trees like aspen and poplar, which are full of moisture and provide a natural resistance to fire. But as a report by the Forest Practices Board of BC pointed out, “Large homogeneous patches of forest are more likely to lead to large and severe wildfires.” [to access the full story a NY Times subscription is required]
The Regional District of Central Kootenay has more than 1,000 water systems, says RDCK board chair Aimee Watson. But although the RDCK owns 19 of those systems, it has very little authority over the health of watershed ecosystems. “…communities are at the mercy of whatever is occurring on Crown land,” Watson said, and most often that means logging. Timber operations can damage or destroy individual residents’ water systems, and they can cause landslides or flooding. Large new housing developments are also an issue. They tend to tap into water sources without first checking to see if there is enough. “There is nobody overviewing this kind of thing, how it will all work together,” Watson says. “And then you throw in climate change.” The RDCK wants the province to enact legislation that would require developers and timber companies, in collaboration with communities, to prepare detailed community watershed management plans
HOUSTON, BC — I read with concern that Canfor is asking its employees and the public to lobby politicians and ministers to guarantee long-term, economic fibre to support the replacement of its closed mill in Houston. This replacement mill would produce less-finished goods, provide fewer jobs and already has a share of the timber supply. Timber supply should not be a political decision influenced by Canfor public relations lobbying. …I support investing in sustainable forest jobs. I have worked with foresters, ecologists, researchers and the public to develop sustainable plan options which maintain local forestry jobs and our economy while maintaining a healthy forest ecosystem. …I disagree with political guarantees of economic fibre based on lobbying and I am for corporations making their own economic decisions.
EDMONTON — This year’s summer of fire in Western Canada has been a real test on many fronts… leaving a lot of people with the wrong kind of memories. …The fires and accompanying evacuations have also created a lot of pressure on Edmonton, and in particular for our emergency reception facility at the Expo Centre. The venue was stood up in response to three major evacuations — Drayton Valley, Edson and Yellowknife. …The centre has so far been active for 55 days and has assisted more than 12,300 evacuees. …With Edmonton situated on the edge of huge swaths of boreal forest to the west and north, and with climate change ready to serve up bigger, longer and more severe wildfire seasons, our city is going to have an increasingly common role as an evacuation hub.
A bill to improve how the federal government tracks wildfire prevention work passed the House in a near-unanimous 406-4 vote Wednesday, a month after the nation’s deadliest wildfire in over 100 years killed at least 115 people in Hawaii. The bill, the Accurately Counting Risk Elimination Solutions (ACRES) Act, was proposed this year after an NBC News report revealed that the government has long overstated how much of the country’s federal forests it has protected from catastrophic fires. A 2022 NBC News investigation found that the U.S. Forest Service had overstated how much land it treats to reduce wildfire risk by an estimated 21% over a 15-year period. The overstatement was largely a result of the agency repeatedly counting an area of land if multiple kinds of work were done on the same spot — a practice oversight agencies had warned against for two decades.
Two renowned Minnesota old-growth forests — the Lost 40 Scientific and Natural Area in Itasca County and the Itasca Wilderness Sanctuary SNA in Clearwater County — will be the first in the state to join the national Old-Growth Forest Network. The network recognizes existing old-growth forests across the nation and highlights the importance of preserving these areas. “Minnesota has 48,000 acres of protected old-growth forest” Minnesota DNR Forest Ecologist Emily Peters said. …The DNR has a longstanding goal to protect this rare and important forest resource on state lands.” The Old-Growth Forest Network is a nonprofit working to connect people with nature by creating a voluntary national network of protected, publicly accessible forests. The network’s goal is to identify and ensure the preservation and recognition of at least one forest in every county in the U.S. where forests grow.
The Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Senator Pippa Hackett, has today announced a public call for innovative projects which support and highlight the environmental, social and economic benefits of forestry, forests and timber products. Funding will be allocated by the Department by means of an open competition under the Forestry Promotion Projects Support Fund. …”There is widespread support for promoting greater awareness and education about the many functions, benefits, and culture of forests. A need has been identified to re-establish a more rooted understanding of the value of forests, collective support for forest expansion and a nationwide awareness of the potential of wood products,” said Hackett.
The 2023 wildfire season has sadly proved to be a record-breaker, including the largest ever-recorded in the European Union. According to the latest data from the EU’s Joint Research Centre, wildfires on the continent this year emitted some 20 million tonnes of carbon dioxide, with 468,289 hectares burnt in Europe. Although this is down from the 748,426 hectares burnt in 2022, the latest data from the JRC notes how the wildfires this summer had an exceptional impact in terms of how they affected tourist areas, hitting local economies hard. The question now is what can be done to lessen the impact of future wildfire seasons, and whether much more should be in terms of reforestation and prevention. One organization leading this charge is the search engine Ecosia, which recently announced it will invest €800,000 into wildfire prevention and restoration schemes.