Glorieta Camps Prescribed Burning to Begin with Arrival of Snow on January 19

Glorieta Camps Prescribed Burning to Begin with Arrival of Snow on January 19

Glorieta Camps, The Nature Conservancy’s Rio Grande Water Fund and the Forest Stewards Guild plan to take advantage of favorable conditions on January 19th, including snow levels, air quality, wind direction, and weather forecasts, to initiate prescribed pile burning at Glorieta Camps. This is the first of ongoing burns throughout the winter when conditions are favorable.

This burn is part of the Camps’ long-term commitment to improve forest health and reduce the risks of wildfire. Smoke and flames may be visible due to the proximity of the site to I-25 and the town of Glorieta. This prescribed burn is happening in the context of the Greater Santa Fe Fireshed Coalition landscape. The Fireshed Coalition supports a HEPA Filter Loan Program so that smoke sensitive individuals can borrow a filter for the duration of the impacts.

  • This will be the third winter of burning at Glorieta Camps with the Forest Stewards Guild and the Nature Conservancy. The previous two winters were successful at burning, mopping up piles, and patrolling until out.

  • Up to 50 acres of piles will be treated with hand ignitions by trained and qualified firefighters.

  • This burn will be implemented within the parameters of an approved burn plan.

  • The burn is in full compliance with County and state of New Mexico Smoke Permits.

  • The burn will be implemented with qualified and experienced personnel.

  • All burn operations will occur with at least 4” of snow on the ground.

  • The burn will be patrolled and mopped up by trained people until it is out.

  • Small amounts of piles may be burned each day to limit risk.  

  • The burn unit has fireline around it as an additional contingency measure.

  • More information on HEPA Filter Loan Program can be accessed here: http://www.santafefireshed.org/hepa-filter-loan-program.   

The AHAL Burn Team is supported by an agreement with The Nature Conservancy.  
The Forest Stewards Guild is an equal opportunity provider.
###

Wildfire Wednesdays #102: Wildfire and Wildlife

Hi Fireshed Community,

As we all know, the forest is home to more than just our human communities. These cold winter months when we spend more time at home provide a great opportunity to learn about how we might improve the balance between wildfire management and wildlife management. This is complex and there is no silver bullet to managing wildfire in a way that supports all species in a positive way. There will always be winners and losers with any type of management action — even when we take no action.

This Wildfire Wednesdays will provide some resources for you to better understand the effects of wildfire and wildfire risk reduction treatments, such as thinning and RX Fire, on wildlife.

This newsletter includes:

  • An overview of the effects of wildfire on wildlife from The Wildlife Professional

  • A New Mexico-Specific Science Synthesis of Forest and Woodland Treatment Effects on Wildlife

  • Upcoming and recorded webinars related to fire and wildlife

Stay safe,

Gabe

Wildfire! Toward Understanding Its Effects on Wildlife — from The Wildlife Professional

Wildlife professionals know many North American ecosystems are fire-adapted and require fire to shape their structures, functions and processes, which in turn shape wildlife habitats and populations in important ways. Over the past century, however, synergistic effects of fire exclusion, livestock grazing, timber harvest and land development have led to conditions where many wildfires are larger and burn with greater intensity and severity than they did in the past.

To better understand the overarching effects of wildfire on wildlife species, read this article from The Wildlife Professional.

Assessment of Forest and Woodland Treatment Effects on Wildlife

In 2019, the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish worked with the Forest Stewards Guild to complete a science synthesis of the effects of forest and woodland treatments on wildlife species. This guide is helpful to understanding how wildfire risk reduction treatments through thinning and prescribed fire may effect various wildlife species in across a range of forest types.

This guide may be useful for New Mexico landowners that want to manage their forest for a particular species of concern. Click here to access the New Mexico science synthesis.

For specific information about the effect of wildfire on birds, check out this Science You Can Use briefing paper titled “Birds and Burns.”

Webinars Related to Wildfire and Wildlife

Upcoming

Fueling Collaboration: Fire and Wildlife

8:00 Pacific / 9:00 Mountain / 10:00 Central / 11:00 Eastern  (1.5 hr)
The third panel discussion of season 3 of the “Fueling Collaboration” series from eastern JFSP Fire Science Exchanges and USFS Northern and Southern Research Stations will be moderated by Lauren Pile Knapp (register).

Recorded

The Effects of Prescribed Fire on Wildfire Regimes and Impacts

Presenter: Dr. Molly Hunter, USGS SW Climate Adaptation Science Center, Research Manager / Joint Fire Science Program, Science Advisor

To access the webinar, click here.

Prescribed fire can result in significant benefits to ecosystems and society. Examples include improved wildlife habitat, enhanced biodiversity, reduced threat of destructive wildfire, and enhanced ecosystem resilience. Prescribed fire can also come with costs, such as reduced air quality and impacts to fire sensitive species. To plan for appropriate use of prescribed fire, managers need information on the tradeoffs between prescribed fire and wildfire regimes.

Science and Management of Wildfire, Fish, and Water Resources in the Western US

Presenter: Dr. Patrick Belmont, Utah State University

To access the webinar, click here.

Wildfire has increased 20-fold in the last 30 years in the Western U.S., partly due to climate change and partly due to forest and fire management practices. At the same time, many water resources are drying up. And fish populations throughout the western US are struggling due to water diversions, instream barriers, invasive species, and dwindling flows. This talk integrated across these three big, converging problems, reframing the role of wildfire in western ecosystems, discussing how wildfire, fish, and water resource problems are interrelated, and proposing solutions that match the scale of the problem.

Wildfire Wednesdays #101: Winter Means Preparing for Wildfire

Happy Wednesday and Happy Solstice, FAC NM readers!

As we celebrate the longest night of the year and the official start to winter, next year’s summertime wildfires may feel like a far-flung dream. However, it is never too early to start gearing up for fire mitigation, both around your home and in your community. While fire preparedness is year-round, winter is actually one of the best times to tackle heavy duty fire preparedness tasks.

Today’s Wildfire Wednesday features information on:

  • Creating defensible space

  • FAC Net’s Guide to Starting a Chipping Program in Your Community

  • A funding opportunity for FAC NM members to kickstart your community’s fire preparedness

  • Fire guides: information on home hardening, fire preparedness checklists, and yard tips

  • A video series on 7 Saturdays to a More Fire Resistant Home

Take care, happy holidays, and we look forward to connecting with you in the new year.

Rachel

Creating Defensible Space

Don’t disregard it: defensible space requires maintenance

Winter is often the best time to take steps to defend against fire, such as thinning out dense patches of trees, removing flammable brush and weeds, and pruning the limbs of mature trees to reduce contiguous fuels. Thinning and pruning during the cold winter months can also help reduce pest and disease infection in your trees and shrubs.

Maintenance tasks such as clearing flammable debris from gutters and around the home, making sure there are no flammable materials like firewood or patio furniture near your structures, and keeping grass and weeds mowed to less than 4 inches are all things you can do in these winter months and as part of spring cleaning to keep your home protected.

Whether you are a homeowner, renter, or transient temporary resident, your home is located in an environment that is dynamic and constantly changing. Trees and shrubs continue to grow, plants die or are damaged, new plants establish and grow, and needles and leaves drop to the ground, forming duff. Like other parts of your home, defensible space requires upkeep and conscious decision-making about your space, such as the choice to plant native grasses.

New Mexico State University ACES college, Firewise®, and Western Fire Chiefs Association (WFCA) are just a few of the entities which offer information and checklists to guide your creation of defensible zones and upkeep of defensible space.

Checklist from NMSU and Firewise® on defensible space actions that can be taken annually

 

“Defensible space is the buffer you create between a building… and the grass, trees, shrubs, or any wildland area that surrounds it. This space is needed to slow or stop the spread of wildfire and it helps protect your home from catching fire—either from embers, direct flame contact or radiant heat. Proper defensible space also provides firefighters a safe area to work in, to defend your home.”

- (CAL FIRE, Ready for Wildfire)

A Chip Off the Old Block

A Guide to Starting a Chipping Program in Your Community

From FAC Net: “As we say farewell to summer and winter settles in, and FAC practitioners start planning for next year, some of you may have chipping programs on your mind. Indeed, a chipping program is an important part of many fuels mitigation projects. To help you plan and dream, we have collected some insights from the field and a few practitioners to share here with you. This is hardly a comprehensive roundup, and it is not a prescriptive document as the thing that works best for you may be very different from some of your peers in the field.

When starting or revamping a chipping program, there are several things to consider, including  assessing need, funding, staffing, outreach and marketing, chipper selection, access and functional needs, chip dispersal and use, and program improvement year over year.”

  • Assessing Need

  • Funding

  • Staffing

  • Outreach and Marketing

  • Chipper Selection

  • Access and Functional Needs

  • Chip Dispersal and Use

  • Programmatic Involvement

Visit http://fireadaptednetwork.org/ under ‘blog’ or click the button below to learn more about starting a chipper program in your community.

Funding Opportunity

Application Period Open Now Through January 15:
FAC NM Microgrants for Fire Adapted Activities

FAC NM Leaders and Members are eligible to apply for grants of up to $2,000 for financial assistance with:

  • convening wildfire preparedness events

  • enabling on-the-ground community fire risk mitigation work

  • developing grant proposals for the sustainable longevity of their Fire Adapted Community endeavor.

Applications for Round 1 are open now and close on January 15th! Visit the FAC NM Resources page or https://facnm.org/microgrants to learn more and apply now.

Tips and Tasks

Guidance on making your space fire adapted this winter

Home Hardening

Defensible space splits the area around your home or structure into treatment zones; you can think of internal and external home hardening and yard tasks as additional zones which are prime candidates for wintertime fire preparedness.

Fire hardened does not mean fireproof; it means your home is prepared for wildfire and ember storms. Home hardening addresses the most vulnerable components of your house with building materials and installation techniques that increase resistance to heat, flames, and embers that accompany most wildfires.

Text against a mauve background identifying top 3 home hardening priorities

Priorities text courtesy of Santa Clara County FireSafe Council

Yard Preparation and Considerations

Text describing possibly yard fire preparedness tasks with a drawing below of the expanded home ignition zones defensible space, up to 200'

Image courtesy of the ‘Tips and Tricks for the Yard’ webpage from SCC FireSafe Council. Visit the website for additional resources related to each yard area.

An extension of defensible space, the tips and tasks are presented below can be done to prepare your yard and property for wildfire season now and throughout the year.

Property areas and considerations include:

  • borders, hedges, and dry vegetative debris

  • slash chipping and mulch

  • pests, disease, and vegetation spacing

  • attics and crawl space vents

  • considerations for birds

  • holiday tree safety

  • and more.

Inside and Outside the Home

Booklet cover for FEMA's guide to Protect Your Property from Wildfire featuring an image of fire spreading across a grassy landscape with barren trees in the background

Property protection booklet cover image courtesy of FEMA.

“Owning a property is one of the most important investments most people make in their lives. We work hard to provide a home and a future for ourselves and our loved ones... While you can’t prevent all wildfires from happening, there are some ways to secure your property to minimize damage and keep your home and your future safe.”

Click the image or download the PDF from FEMA to learn simple tricks for how to fortify your space this winter, inside and outside of the home.

 

Additional resources

Colorado State University and New Mexico Energy, Minerals, and Natural Resources Department offer an applicable collection of Fire Preparedness Resources for homes, pets, and family, and a Living with Wildfire Guide, respectively. Throughout the cold season, set aside some time to click through and visit these resources. An excerpt of topics includes:

7 Saturdays to a More Fire Resistant Home

A video series on easy and affordable steps to better prepare for wildfires

Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) released a 7-part series with helpful information on and recommendations for how to prepare to live with fire. View episode 1 on defensible space below then visit PG&E’s YouTube page to learn more about affordable home hardening, preparing for evacuation, fire resistant landscaping, resilient interiors, and resilient communities.

Announcement of Opportunities for Public Involvement in the Santa Fe Mountains Project

With the re-release of a Santa Fe area forest resiliency project’s environmental assessment, several opportunities for public engagement and dialogue have been made available.

Interactive Webinar: Thursday, December 15 at 6:00pm

The Greater Santa Fe Fireshed Coalition will host a livestream webinar on the ecological role of fire in the Santa Fe mountains. The public discussion will include presentations by subject matter experts with decades of forestry and fire science experience in the landscape surrounding Santa Fe. Your participation this Thursday is encouraged to keep the conversation going!

When: December 15 at 6pm

Where: Facebook Live virtual platform

Who: Greater Santa Fe Fireshed Coalition (host and facilitator)

How to join: GSFFC Facebook page under “events”

Read a recently published Santa Fe New Mexican opinion piece by Thursday's subject matter experts and revisit Wildfire Wednesdays blog #100 discussing this and other local fire and forest science resources.

Santa Fe Mountains Landscape Resiliency Project EA release & comment period

The Santa Fe National Forest announced on Friday, December 9 that they were reinitiating a 45-day objection period for the Santa Fe Mountains Landscape Resiliency Project environmental assessment (EA). This legal document incorporates heritage, wildlife, and a number of other surveys which describe the current condition of the landscape and assess the impact of a number of potential forest and fuels resiliency treatment options.

The SFMLRP draft decision notice by the US Forest Service highlights the need to make the forested landscapes around Santa Fe more resilient to the threats of climate change, drought, and wildfire. This need has been realized in collaboration with other federal agencies, state, local, and Tribal representatives, and non-governmental and community organizations, including the Greater Santa Fe Fireshed Coalition.

Those who previously submitted comments during this EA’s previous scoping or comment periods can submit a new objection during the 45-day objection period, or by January 23, 2023.

Wildfire Wednesdays #100: Revisiting Local Knowledge about Fire in Our Landscape

Hi Fireshed Community,

We are excited to share our 100th Wildfire Wednesdays newsletter with you! 🎂 Over the years, we have used this bi-weekly blog as a forum for sharing resources and best practices across the state. We hope you have found it helpful in your work and we want to thank you for continuing to forward it along to coworkers, friends, family, and neighbors

As we move into the next 100 Wildfire Wednesdays, we want to encourage our readers to please reach out and share resources or success stories with us to highlight. We would love to amplify the great work that you all are doing around your homes and in your communities by featuring it in the Wildfire Wednesdays blog.

For this week’s Wildfire Wednesday we want to feature some local fire and forest science that can support our understanding about the ecological role of wildfire in New Mexico’s forests.

This week’s newsletter includes:

  • An interactive webinar (12/15) focused on forest and fire science in the Santa Fe Mountains

  • A webpage of scientific research relevant to Northern New Mexico

  • A (re)-introduction to the Southwest Fire Science Consortium

Stay safe,

Gabe

Interactive Webinar: The Ecological Role of Fire in the Santa Fe Mountains

Click here to download and share the flyer!

To join the event, go to the Fireshed’s Facebook page on December 15th at 6pm! To view the event directly and RSVP, click here.

Presentations by subject matter experts with decades of forestry and fire science experience in the Santa Fe Mountains, including:

  • Dr. Ellis Margolis, USGS

  • Dr. Craig Allen, UNM

  • Dr. Tom Swetnam

Craig D. Allen is a research scholar in the Department of Geography and Environmental Studies at the University of New Mexico. He lives in Nambé. Ellis Margolis is a USGS research ecologist working with the Fort Collins research center with in-depth research experience in the Santa Fe Mountains. He lives in Santa Fe. Thomas W. Swetnam is Regents Professor Emeritus, Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research, University of Arizona. He lives in Jemez Springs.

A Sampling of Local and Southwest-Focused Scientific Articles and Forest Treatment ReporT

Locally-relevant, up-to-date scientific information is essential for ecologically appropriate land management decisions. This includes decisions made on public land as well as those made on private lands — even in our backyards.

Since scientific findings can only be applied to specific context that they were designed for, there is a large amount of research related to fire and forestry. Some studies can provide us with broadly applicable findings, and others may only hold up when they applied to the specific forest that was included in the research. In much of Northern New Mexico, and especially in the Santa Fe Mountains area, we are fortunate to have a wealth of forest and fire science research that was specifically conducted in this landscape. To help provide our readers with some of the most locally-appropriate scientific studies for Northern New Mexico, the Greater Santa Fe Fireshed Coalition developed a webpage that provides a sampling of Local and Southwest-Focused Scientific Articles and Forest Treatment Reports.

Before you dig into the pile of publications listed on the webpage, start by reading these 5 topically diverse forest and fire research publications:

Next, you will find a broader list of northern New Mexico- and Southwest-focused forest and fire research articles as well as local forest treatment success stories below. Review at your leisure for additional science and practical information.

To view the full webpage of research articles, click here.

A (Re)-introduction to the Southwest Fire Science Consortium

The consortium is a way for managers, scientists, and policy makers to interact and share science. The goal is to see the best science used to make management decisions and scientists working on the questions managers need answered. The Southwest is one of the most fire-dominated regions of the US, and the Consortium is the only regional organization focused on fire research and information dissemination across agency, administrative, and state boundaries. The Consortium tries to bring together localized efforts to develop scientific information and to disseminate that to practitioners on the ground through an inclusive and open process. Please join the Consortium by attending a field trip or workshop, reading and sharing the materials on their website, and/or contributing to the fire conversation by submitting a proposal for an event or product.

To visit the Southwest Fire Science Consortium’s webpage, click here.

To view a list of publications and resources, click here.

Key objectives

  • Disseminate current science and facilitate its use among scientists, practitioners, and managers

  • Facilitate communication and collaboration among stakeholders

  • Identify and develop knowledge relevant to practitioners, managers, and policy makers

  • Develop methods to assess the quality and applicability of research

  • Demonstrate research on the ground

  • Build place-based adaptive management partnerships that promote adoption of fire science findings by fire, fuel, and land managers

  • Develop mechanisms to assess new research, synthesis, or validation needs




The GSFFC is a coalition of public and private organizations. The GSFFC is not a subdivision of the State of New Mexico, as defined in the state’s Open Meetings Act, §§ 10-15-1 to 10-15-4 NMSA 1978. Although federal agencies participate in the GSFFC, the Coalition is not a federal advisory board and was not created by a federal agency, as defined by the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), 5.U.S.C. app. 2, §§ 1 to 16 (2012). The GSFFC operates informally to support its partners, and is not incorporated as a non-profit, 501(C)(3), partnership, or other legal status.