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A hundred miles north of this fire, at the Armstrong Redwood State Park, there is another lightning-caused wildfire that is burning through an old growth grove.

A hundred miles north of this fire, at the Armstrong Redwood State Park, there is another lightning-caused wildfire that is burning through an old growth grove. That fire is burning through the forest floor only, and is significantly less dangerous. The 1400-year-old Armstrong tree, and park buildings, have been protected, while the fire is free to burn through the surrounding undergrowth. Everyone involved seems to suggest that the fire is a net positive for the forest, and an overdue ecological renewal. https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/news/flames-yet-to-reach-armstrong-woods-old-growth-forest/ https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/news/flames-yet-to-rea... While it's definitely sad to see historic buildings destroyed, not to mention hundreds of homes, I look forward to returning to Big Basin over the next few years to witness this renewal first-hand.

thaumasiotes 6y ago
> The 1400-year-old Armstrong tree The bare fact that a tree is 1400 years old is pretty strong evidence that it's unlikely to be harmed by a fire.
- zorpner 6y ago
  The global temperature anomaly is already out-of-range for not only the lifetime of this tree, but much of its evolutionary history. We are entering an out-of-context situation for a large portion of the earth's extant lifeforms.
  - samcheng 6y ago
    Agreed. Also, these trees must now survive a hundred years of aggressive fire suppression, which (ironically) allows fuel to build up to dangerous levels. Either way, these trees are a lot safer after surviving a fire.
    - pvaldes 6y ago
      Again, the forest does not burn each summer. Is the job of arsonists in the majority of the times. This is a criminal problem. Is domestic terrorism Claiming that fuel is increasing and somebody should burn the forest attract lunatics and does not help to have a future with water, or to decrease the levels of CO2 in the air. We desperately require the CO2 stored in plants and in soil and this is not compatible with the old "time to burn" parties and traditions. Brazil and half of Africa is burning today and this is not acceptable. We must change our speech. Now.
      - dividedbyzero 6y ago
        Not sure about California in particular, but I think a pretty solid case can be made for controlled burning of environments that have evolved around regular wildfires. It's how these ecosystems work, and have worked well for a long, long time, and we risk damaging or collapsing those ecosystems if we take fire suppression too far. Besides, while having lunatics torch forests is not desirable at all, fuel accumulation isn't fictional. Again, no idea about California in particular, but it's definitely a problem in parts of Spain, and controlled burns are already a thing there, I believe that's being done in the US, too, with good success so far. I get that it's no fun having wildfires, even controlled ones, behind one's backyard, but it's probably not sustainable to not have any at all, forever. Even if fires can be suppressed effectively for a long time, when a fire eventually escapes suppression, and one probably will, it'll find many years of bone-dry plant matter to consume; that'll release all of the CO2 at once, and it would make for a very destructive firestorm. At least that's my layperson's understanding. The criminal burning of the Amazon, way beyond what any wildfires would do, that absolutely must stop.
        jupp0r 6y ago
        In California, controlled burns are now happening all the time (although not enough).
        deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
        6y ago
  - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
    You're misunderstanding something here. The global temperature anomaly is substantially smaller than even day to day variations in temperature, and completely dwarfed by seasonal or day-night variations. The problems expected from climate change are almost entirely systemic - few individual lifeforms will end up in an out-of-context situation. In this specific case, a 1400 year old tree will surely have seen some wildfires before.
  - chrisco255 6y ago
    California has been subject to century long droughts in the not too distant past (about 1000 years ago). "BEGINNING about 1,100 years ago, what is now California baked in two droughts, the first lasting 220 years and the second 140 years. Each was much more intense than the mere six-year dry spells that afflict modern California from time to time, new studies of past climates show. The findings suggest, in fact, that relatively wet periods like the 20th century have been the exception rather than the rule in California for at least the last 3,500 years, and that mega-droughts are likely to recur." https://www.nytimes.com/1994/07/19/science/severe-ancient-droughts-a-warning-to-california.html https://www.nytimes.com/1994/07/19/science/severe-ancient-dr... What's amazing is that many of these trees survived that. And that modern humans think modern California is "normal".
    - h0l0cube 6y ago
      Further to that, the global temperature anomaly has caused rainfall patterns to change, meaning some places are trending wetter, and some drier, and crucially, volatility has increased. Having wet seasons, generating fuel load, followed by dry is more problematic than a sustained drought.
      - selectodude 6y ago
        I remember driving through the Santa Monica Mountains on my way to Malibu right after Southern California was absolutely deluged by rain for weeks. It was one of the most stunning displays I've ever seen in person. Three years later Malibu burned down. So it goes.
      - bcrosby95 6y ago
        This was actually part of my theory of why California electric companies got so lazy about tree and brush removal around their power lines. I don't think it's a coincidence that just 1 year after exiting a 6 year drought state power companies started huge fires in both Northern and Southern California.
        h0l0cube 6y ago
  - cft 6y ago
    ”Earth's surface became entirely or nearly entirely frozen, sometime earlier than 650 Mya (million years ago) during the Cryogenian period. " https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snowball_Earth https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snowball_Earth Note that animal (multicellular eukaryotes) fossils exist from that period.
  - labster 6y ago
    Meh, there are metasequoia fossils in Alaska, I’m pretty sure the 3 sequoia species will be winners in climate change.
- mehrdadn 6y ago
  >> The 1400-year-old Armstrong tree > The bare fact that a tree is 1400 years old is pretty strong evidence that it's unlikely to be harmed by a fire. For fires the likes of which they've experienced in their lifetimes, perhaps. Hard to know otherwise: "What is remarkable about the CZU fire is this is a coastal fire, primarily along the the coast near the Santa Cruz mountains... in forests, a lot of redwoods, that have simply never seen forest fires... we are dealing with different climate conditions that are precipitating in fires the likes of which we haven't seen in modern recorded history in dense forests that are well-covered and have been historically immune from significant fires." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiyG9JXNspk&t=9m28s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiyG9JXNspk&t=9m28s
  - thaumasiotes 6y ago
    You are aware that modern recorded history in California goes back much, much less than 1400 years?
    - mehrdadn 6y ago
      Depends what he means by "modern recorded history", but yes, I'm aware of basic history, thank you very much. What I was saying was that it is not at all obvious whether they have actually experienced such fires before or not; it seems possible they haven't.
    - saalweachter 6y ago
      Recorded by humans. Tree rings are also a record of history.
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
  - dnautics 6y ago
    Have you ever been to a redwood Grove? Even on the coasts, All of the oldest trees have burnt out cores and are doing fine.
drawkbox 6y ago
Takes more than a forest fire to kill off the ents.
me_me_me 6y ago
> Everyone involved seems to suggest that the fire is a net positive for the forest, and an overdue ecological renewal. Nature has adopted to occasional fire, difference here is that humans decided they can stop forest fires. And we did. But with that the undergrowth became more and more dangerous. This slow buildup results in bigger and more aggressive fires. I am not sure how those are impacting the forests vs natural more mild fires.
12xo 6y ago
Fire vs firestorms. A slow moving, low fuel burn is very good for the forest. A fast moving, extremely hot firestorm will burn everything to bits and destroy the ecosystem for decades. Redwoods, and other plants and trees cannot survive a firestorm. This is the problem with our forest fires these days. They are too hot because the fuel is both dry and overgrown and condensed into non-natural areas. When we build so many homes and cities in the forests, we change their natural make-up and put everything at risk.

thaumasiotes 6y ago

> The 1400-year-old Armstrong tree The bare fact that a tree is 1400 years old is pretty strong evidence that it's unlikely to be harmed by a fire.

zorpner 6y ago
The global temperature anomaly is already out-of-range for not only the lifetime of this tree, but much of its evolutionary history. We are entering an out-of-context situation for a large portion of the earth's extant lifeforms.
- samcheng 6y ago
  Agreed. Also, these trees must now survive a hundred years of aggressive fire suppression, which (ironically) allows fuel to build up to dangerous levels. Either way, these trees are a lot safer after surviving a fire.
  - pvaldes 6y ago
    Again, the forest does not burn each summer. Is the job of arsonists in the majority of the times. This is a criminal problem. Is domestic terrorism Claiming that fuel is increasing and somebody should burn the forest attract lunatics and does not help to have a future with water, or to decrease the levels of CO2 in the air. We desperately require the CO2 stored in plants and in soil and this is not compatible with the old "time to burn" parties and traditions. Brazil and half of Africa is burning today and this is not acceptable. We must change our speech. Now.
    - dividedbyzero 6y ago
      Not sure about California in particular, but I think a pretty solid case can be made for controlled burning of environments that have evolved around regular wildfires. It's how these ecosystems work, and have worked well for a long, long time, and we risk damaging or collapsing those ecosystems if we take fire suppression too far. Besides, while having lunatics torch forests is not desirable at all, fuel accumulation isn't fictional. Again, no idea about California in particular, but it's definitely a problem in parts of Spain, and controlled burns are already a thing there, I believe that's being done in the US, too, with good success so far. I get that it's no fun having wildfires, even controlled ones, behind one's backyard, but it's probably not sustainable to not have any at all, forever. Even if fires can be suppressed effectively for a long time, when a fire eventually escapes suppression, and one probably will, it'll find many years of bone-dry plant matter to consume; that'll release all of the CO2 at once, and it would make for a very destructive firestorm. At least that's my layperson's understanding. The criminal burning of the Amazon, way beyond what any wildfires would do, that absolutely must stop.
      - jupp0r 6y ago
        In California, controlled burns are now happening all the time (although not enough).
        deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
      - 6y ago
- SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  You're misunderstanding something here. The global temperature anomaly is substantially smaller than even day to day variations in temperature, and completely dwarfed by seasonal or day-night variations. The problems expected from climate change are almost entirely systemic - few individual lifeforms will end up in an out-of-context situation. In this specific case, a 1400 year old tree will surely have seen some wildfires before.
- chrisco255 6y ago
  California has been subject to century long droughts in the not too distant past (about 1000 years ago). "BEGINNING about 1,100 years ago, what is now California baked in two droughts, the first lasting 220 years and the second 140 years. Each was much more intense than the mere six-year dry spells that afflict modern California from time to time, new studies of past climates show. The findings suggest, in fact, that relatively wet periods like the 20th century have been the exception rather than the rule in California for at least the last 3,500 years, and that mega-droughts are likely to recur." https://www.nytimes.com/1994/07/19/science/severe-ancient-droughts-a-warning-to-california.html https://www.nytimes.com/1994/07/19/science/severe-ancient-dr... What's amazing is that many of these trees survived that. And that modern humans think modern California is "normal".
  - h0l0cube 6y ago
    Further to that, the global temperature anomaly has caused rainfall patterns to change, meaning some places are trending wetter, and some drier, and crucially, volatility has increased. Having wet seasons, generating fuel load, followed by dry is more problematic than a sustained drought.
    - selectodude 6y ago
      I remember driving through the Santa Monica Mountains on my way to Malibu right after Southern California was absolutely deluged by rain for weeks. It was one of the most stunning displays I've ever seen in person. Three years later Malibu burned down. So it goes.
    - bcrosby95 6y ago
      This was actually part of my theory of why California electric companies got so lazy about tree and brush removal around their power lines. I don't think it's a coincidence that just 1 year after exiting a 6 year drought state power companies started huge fires in both Northern and Southern California.
      - h0l0cube 6y ago
- cft 6y ago
  ”Earth's surface became entirely or nearly entirely frozen, sometime earlier than 650 Mya (million years ago) during the Cryogenian period. " https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snowball_Earth https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snowball_Earth Note that animal (multicellular eukaryotes) fossils exist from that period.
- labster 6y ago
  Meh, there are metasequoia fossils in Alaska, I’m pretty sure the 3 sequoia species will be winners in climate change.
mehrdadn 6y ago
>> The 1400-year-old Armstrong tree > The bare fact that a tree is 1400 years old is pretty strong evidence that it's unlikely to be harmed by a fire. For fires the likes of which they've experienced in their lifetimes, perhaps. Hard to know otherwise: "What is remarkable about the CZU fire is this is a coastal fire, primarily along the the coast near the Santa Cruz mountains... in forests, a lot of redwoods, that have simply never seen forest fires... we are dealing with different climate conditions that are precipitating in fires the likes of which we haven't seen in modern recorded history in dense forests that are well-covered and have been historically immune from significant fires." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiyG9JXNspk&t=9m28s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiyG9JXNspk&t=9m28s
- thaumasiotes 6y ago
  You are aware that modern recorded history in California goes back much, much less than 1400 years?
  - mehrdadn 6y ago
    Depends what he means by "modern recorded history", but yes, I'm aware of basic history, thank you very much. What I was saying was that it is not at all obvious whether they have actually experienced such fires before or not; it seems possible they haven't.
  - saalweachter 6y ago
    Recorded by humans. Tree rings are also a record of history.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
- dnautics 6y ago
  Have you ever been to a redwood Grove? Even on the coasts, All of the oldest trees have burnt out cores and are doing fine.

drawkbox 6y ago

Takes more than a forest fire to kill off the ents.

me_me_me 6y ago

> Everyone involved seems to suggest that the fire is a net positive for the forest, and an overdue ecological renewal. Nature has adopted to occasional fire, difference here is that humans decided they can stop forest fires. And we did. But with that the undergrowth became more and more dangerous. This slow buildup results in bigger and more aggressive fires. I am not sure how those are impacting the forests vs natural more mild fires.

12xo 6y ago

Fire vs firestorms. A slow moving, low fuel burn is very good for the forest. A fast moving, extremely hot firestorm will burn everything to bits and destroy the ecosystem for decades. Redwoods, and other plants and trees cannot survive a firestorm. This is the problem with our forest fires these days. They are too hot because the fuel is both dry and overgrown and condensed into non-natural areas. When we build so many homes and cities in the forests, we change their natural make-up and put everything at risk.