1999 RESOLUTIONS
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Resolution
#2: Prescribed Burning
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| Fire has played a major
historical role in shaping our grasslands and forests. There has
been a series of well-publicized wildland fires within the last
decade. Studies have shown that at least some of these fires
were caused by the management policies in this century which suppressed
and virtually excluded naturally-occurring fires. This can, and
has, created ecosystem imbalances and unnatural fuel buildups in many
areas. |
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| The importance of fire in
dry climate forest ecosystems has been understood for much of this
century. As early as 1923, it was noted that "The Sierra Nevada
forest, as the white man found it, was clearly the result of periodic
or irregular firing over many thousands of years". Harold Weaver
of the USDA began a campaign in 1943 to show that "complete prevention
of forest fires in the ponderosa pine region of the Pacific Slope has
certain undesirable ecological effects." |
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| As scientific knowledge
continues to grow, especially in the last decade, our understanding of
the importance of fire in the ecological process becomes
clearer. Now we understand that fire is a vital part in the
regenerative cycle of our forests and wild lands. |
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| FWOC and its members and
member clubs can support prescribed burning where necessary in certain
circumstances as a valid management policy in urban/wildland
interfaces, in order to sustain the health of our forests and to
protect and human safety as long as appropriate precautions are taken
to control the prescribed burns. |
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| ACTION: Write
state resource management agencies and the US Forest Service. |
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