Forget what Smokey used to say: Fires can be friendly

There was no big wildfire news to report last week from the vicinity of the Hayman burn, and that’s the way everyone wants it.

But there was a blaze due south of the 137,760-acre Hayman burn zone on the other side of U.S. Highway 24. You might call it friendly fire: It began at 8:30 a.m., sending a column of bluegray upward, smoke that wafted toward Florissant.

This time, the Forest Service was burning about 600 acres southwest of Lake George on purpose, hoping to insulate mountain subdivisions from the kind of disaster that struck the area June 8, 2002. The Hayman fire destroyed 133 homes and scorched a swath of land including the eastern edge of Park County, northern Teller County and well into Jefferson and Douglas counties. It cost about $140 million to fight.

Wednesday’s prescribed burn, preceded this year by some timber cutting, was designed to reduce the amount of fuel available to the next wildfire. Experts say prescribed burns are the cheapest way to reduce fire danger and restore ecological health to forests. In addition to reducing fuel loads, prescribed burns help control weeds and encourage a broader diversity of tree species, making the resulting forest less vulnerable to a single pest, such as the bark beetle.

Alas, the Forest Service still is recovering from the effects of its highly successful cartoon character, Smokey Bear. Smokey’s enduring mantra is that “Only you can prevent forest fires” and for many years there was nothing in his message that ever suggested forest fires could be beneficial.

Now, even Smokey’s Web site discusses prescribed burning, but the public relations damage has been done: Fire is bad.

Since 2004, federal agencies have been burning off about 40,000 acres a year in Colorado. That might sound like a lot, but it isn’t.

“We’d like to burn a lot more, but because of smoke concerns and proximity to subdivisions, we can’t,” said District Ranger Sarah Mayben, who took over about six months before the Hayman fire.

That’s right: Although prescribed fires help protect communities whose residents pay nothing for the added insurance, there are complaints about the smoke. Seems like a little haze beats an evacuation order, but people are people.

To be fair, some people worry the fires might get out of control, as occurred in Los Alamos, N.M., where many homes were destroyed by a prescribed burn gone awry.

“The first prescribed burns right after Hayman, there was a lot of concern,” Mayben said.

Experts agree more prescribed burning is needed.

“I think it’s underused,” said Monique Rocca, a fire ecology professor at Colorado State University. Alluding to airborne particles and unwanted haze, Rocca said, “Smoke is a real issue. From an ecological standpoint, I would really like to see it (prescribed burning) used more.”

Rocca thinks “people are more aware of the benefits,” so public acceptance for prescribed fires is growing. That’s good, because Smokey actually was wrong to suggest forest fires can — or should — be prevented. We can only reduce the damage they cause.