Forests "choked with excess fuel" is missing the point. The issue is drought and climate change which is stressing the forests and making wildfire more dangerous. The "excess fuel" myth is promulgated by timber industry and climate deniers. Unsubscribing.
More than a century of aggressive fire suppression has, in fact, increased fuel loads in many Western forests, especially in ecosystems that naturally burned more frequently. This has been well established in the peer-reviewed literature. That doesn’t negate the role of climate change and drought, which are clearly worsening fire weather and lengthening fire seasons. Both factors matter. It's not either/or.
Thanks for sharing this interesting info. The transition from snow to rain is definitely changing the region's hydrology. If you’re interested, I wrote an earlier post about research projecting climate change will shrink the share of Western runoff that comes from the snowpack: https://www.snow.news/p/how-much-runoff-comes-from-snowpack
Forests "choked with excess fuel" is missing the point. The issue is drought and climate change which is stressing the forests and making wildfire more dangerous. The "excess fuel" myth is promulgated by timber industry and climate deniers. Unsubscribing.
More than a century of aggressive fire suppression has, in fact, increased fuel loads in many Western forests, especially in ecosystems that naturally burned more frequently. This has been well established in the peer-reviewed literature. That doesn’t negate the role of climate change and drought, which are clearly worsening fire weather and lengthening fire seasons. Both factors matter. It's not either/or.
Thanks for sharing this interesting info. The transition from snow to rain is definitely changing the region's hydrology. If you’re interested, I wrote an earlier post about research projecting climate change will shrink the share of Western runoff that comes from the snowpack: https://www.snow.news/p/how-much-runoff-comes-from-snowpack