Mass deforestation needed in North America

SPlit hairs all you want, still a really shitty idea. try again

 

Lefties would never agree, less fires dings their climate change argument.

 

This thread had to have been a dare.

 

THE BEST WAY TO MITIGATE 'WILDFIRE' OR CANOPY FIRE IS PRESCRIBED BURNING OR CONTROLLED BURNING. Some forests that have not been routinely burned have an excess of fuel requiring expensive pre-suppression of the excess fire fuels and ladder fuels.

 

“their” argument?! Try vast majority of all who study it. Yes some far right wing politicians and pundits still argue against it. But it’s actually becoming like “arguing” if man walked on the moon.

 

Geez you guys are weirder freaks than we thought.

 

Our national forests are multi-use forests including the sale of timber. Last year private contractors cut and sold $183 million worth of timber from national forests alone.
Agency launches dashboard list of all open timber sales | US Forest Service

BLM sold ~ 100 million board feet worth ~ $60 million in 2022 - the last year I could find records for.
https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/R45688.pdf

Then, of course, there is ~ 443 million acres of privately owned industrial timberlands
https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF12001#:~:text=Most of the 527 million,by state and local governments.

That is a lot of timber harvesting and is subject to market forces. When timber prices are high more people/companies apply to harvest more timber in the national forests and of course this is in play on private forests. I don’t think there is any way to harvest more timber than there is demand for. That sounds like a central planning debacle.
Most of these forests are under active management which includes prescribed fire where it is possible - particularly in the SE US. Smoke management is always an issue in prescribed fire in FL. When smoke blows into a residential area state and national political representatives (who control budgets of land mgmt agencies) will be hearing from their constituents. Several fatal crashes were due to smoke laying down on the roadway instead of dispersing up as the weather conditions predicted.
Fog, smoke likely to blame in deadly crashes involving at least 17 vehicles on I-95 in Florida

Smoke, fog caused 5 deaths, 70-car pileup on I-4 in 2008

And, of course, prescribed fires don’t always remain controlled and people can lose their homes. The fire cited below destroyed 36 homes in a single prescribed 800 acre fire in panhandle Florida.
State-Contracted Firm Caused Wildfire That Burned 36 North Florida Homes

Getting the OK for a prescribed fire relies on a matrix of interacting physical and weather conditions, wind speed, wind direction, relative humidity, fuel load, fuel moisture, and some others I don’t remember. If you do not get a permit and burn outside of those parameters you will be personally responsible for any mayhem that ensues. Few are willing to do that.

Personally, I like for fire managers to leave thick, overgrown tangles of dense brush - that’s where bears and panthers rest and reproduce and they are cool

 

That is not what the OP is saying. At least I am pretty confident that is not what they are advocating.

Here is an article from 2020 that I suspect is the point of the OP….

“For decades, federal, state and local agencies have prioritized fire suppression over prevention, pouring billions of dollars into hiring and training firefighters, buying and maintaining firefighting equipment and educating the public on fire safety.

But as climate change continues to fuel dry conditions in the American West, many experts say it’s long past time to shift the focus back to managing healthy forests that can better withstand fire and add to a more sustainable future….”

Fire experts say mismanaged, choked forests need to be cleared out

 

Or he is a participant in Elon’s Neuralink experiments.

 

It’s amazing (and sad) that some would rather rail against the OP instead of actually look at what he was saying. Our forests need to be maintained with an eye to fire prevention.. not suppression. There is plenty of proof that he is right. We need more forest thinking, co trolled burns, preventative measures.

 

There is quite a bit of it going on and it is difficult and costly to accomplish. People should not think that burning doesn’t occur or that managers don’t want to do more. It costs an estimated $ 50 - 600 per acre for a prescribed burn - less if the unit is huge. This does not includes site prep and replanting nor costs of equipment. Equipment costs are, of course, pro-rated over their life but dozers and tractors an rigged out F-250s are not cheap.

 

I suspect he was just shilling for “big lumber” as he said in his OP more than he gives a shit about forest fires. His OP made no mention of prescribed burns - but “mass deforestation”

 

Okay, how much is there currently in the way of controlled burns and other such measures and how much more should we do?

 

In Florida we are used to low intensity controlled burns because most of our pine forests are adapted to relatively frequent low intensity burns. The exception is sand pine stands which are adapted to high intensity infrequent canopy conflagrations. Before white folk came over such fires were natural due to lightening, and apparently even sometimes set by natives. The arboreal pine and mixed forests up north more resemble the catastrophic canopy fires but that’s how they have rolled for untold thousands of years. Results in a mosaic of different age and type (%deciduous) forests. As a former proficient blueberry picker in both Ontario and Quebec, I’m thankful for the fires because two+ years later there will be a bumper blueberry crop in the newly opened areas. It’s not as efficient as fire but it does allow economic gain from timber harvesting so management through harvesting can result in a similar habitat mosaic… and great blueberries.

 

Mass deforestation is not the same as increasing forest management. He should change the thread title if he doesn’t want people misunderstanding his intent.

 

This is your opinion only. Most lefties I know favor prescription burns and that is my opinion.

Smoke is a huge component of a planned burn and has to be dealt with in the planning stages of every fire. People have asthma and emphysema and COPD and can be seriously affected by thick smoke. If the effects of smoke are ignored and local residents are not apprised of a planned burn that fire manager will not have a job for very long.

 

And there it is. You want affordable lumber. You don’t give a rats ass about forest fires.