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I think forestry management is only a part of the story. New England has houses intermingled with forest, and we make very limited use of controlled burns. Yet
by dahfizz 5y ago
I think forestry management is only a part of the story.
New England has houses intermingled with forest, and we make very limited use of controlled burns. Yet, we don't have forest fires like the west coast. There are two big reasons for this:
1) It rains here. The forest floor is perpetually damp, which makes the risk of a fire starting and spreading much lower.
2) We have mature, native forests. The invasive Eucalyptus tree in CA makes their forest fire problem much worse than it otherwise would be.
- speeder 5y agoWait, seirously? People are growing Eucalyptus in a desert? That is one of the most mind boggling stupidity thing I ever heard of! It is just insane and suicidal to do that! Eucalyptus trees have 60 meter long roots, and use water at absurd amounts! In my country people only have those in places that rain a lot and have a ton of groundwater!
- panzagl 5y agoNot on purpose, hence 'invasive'
- rsync 5y agoOriginally it was on purpose. None other than Jack London had a financial scheme to import these fast growing trees and plant them throughout the Bay Area, etc.: https://gilroydispatch.com/thank-jack-london-for-the-eucalyptus-forest/ https://gilroydispatch.com/thank-jack-london-for-the-eucalyp... I think they are beautiful. Also very dangerous (falling limbs) and explode like torches in a wildfire.
- hedora 5y agoEucalyptus is invasive, but it's not like they're a significant percentage of water usage in CA. Also, they have't played even a minor role in any of the massive forest fires in CA/OR/WA/CO in the last few years. The problem is that it is now too hot and dry for native forests in all those states, so they dry out and burn. (Also, we've been doing fire suppression for 150+ years, and don't rake the forest, so there's a massive fuel build up.)