Not forecasted, but most welcome, is this drizzle that is also falling on the Cameron Peak fire (now 200,000 acres). It won’t put it out but will slow it down.
A younger cousin recently asked me if I remember wildfires, like the recent ones we have, when I was young. My answer was, yes, but they didn’t rage on week after week.
Many people have moved to Colorado, most of the tree hugger inclination, and have settled in the foothills. While I take no pleasure in them losing their homes and possessions, I do hope this year will have them pulling their collective heads out of their asses.
The two easiest, and most cost effective, ways to reduce the size of wildfires is grazing cattle in the National Forests in the summer and logging (removing) dead trees.
Grazing? Yeah, that is what Bison did. Sorry if you’re excellent outdoor hike requires you to avoid cow pies. Yeah, the usual loggers removing dead trees are at the bottom of the socio-economic scale and are an unsavory looking group. Get over it.
10 comments:
Sigh... They want 'pristine' wilderness, not realizing what they want can't happen because there are no longer a million buffalos to graze the grasses, nor free passage for the animals like beavers that routinely took down dead trees for their dams...
Too true, unfortunately.
That's weird. My long range shooter/ranch friends were making the exact same point the other morning, but regards to Texas.
They poured scorn on California...
LSP
Not all refuges from California are deluded. Many are solid citizens. Colorado resort towns have been a great dumping place for trust fund kids. They don't need to work so have time for mischief to go along with their smug superiority.
I was quite surprised to see the rain. There's more for the coming week, but later in the week.
Had a birthday party for one the little ones in the family, so I got to catch up on what's been going on. The in-laws had to evacuate again, and were complaining about some new arrivals in the canyon that want to develop it.
Consensus was (as you agree) that the forests have been mismanaged for the last 25 years, and we're paying for it now.
drjim
Hope your in-laws that evacuated didn't get burned out. Too much of that already.
The main homestead got scorched by the High Park fire 8 years ago, but survived with minimal damage. They're pretty much in the burn scar from that fire, so not a lot of fuel. But they say the smoke is oppressive, so they've been staying at one of their other properties.
I'm sure the smoke, week after week, would make living there intolerable.
Maybe a stupid question-
Can those homes in the fire zone not be built "fire proof"?
New construction has upgrade code requirements but there are many 50-100 year old structures scattered in the foothills. The fires can get very hot. One blogger's (http://every-blade-of-grass.blogspot.com/) in-laws had a Subaru consumed. The fire was so intense the aluminum engine melted. It will take someone more expert than me to say a home can be built to withstand those temperatures.
The amount of money spent fighting these fires would pay many times over for proper forest management that would keep the fires from achieving the intensity we now see. Why isn't it done? Environazis use lawsuits to handcuff trained forestry managers.
https://www.facebook.com/81125319109/videos/3853042411379113/
Post a Comment