Forest fires vs hunting season?

Fires happen all across this province every year. No one makes a fuss about because it has been out of sight of the ignorant masses. Game adapts. They will move out for a while but will back in short order. As soon as we get a few big rains there will be fresh greens that will bring the animals back. You will even find game their beforehand licking the charred remains. It's a great way for them to pick up minerals. Yes we need rain on the island but I'm more concerned with the salmon with the low water levels. Should be a great year for grouse though.
 
Everyone is focused on the south, but the worst conditions are actually in the far north of the province right now. I'm at 58 degrees here and we're flying around fires like nothing I've ever seen before, literally explosive fires so big the plumes jump right to 30,000' and condense and form rain. I've never witnessed updrafts or burn rates like this before either.

Anyone arguing this is natural hasn't considered how humans are altering climate, nothing like this has happened in longer than the lifespans of the oldest trees up here. We're warmer and drier than ever, and folks are right to point out our fire fighting efforts have allowed a lot of fuel to stockpile. When combined with drier than ever, and warmer than ever conditions thanks to human fueled climate change, we're seeing a perfect storm that is not good for the animals. Three years ago we had a big burn close by, and it's still utterly and completely dead- no moose, no wolves, no bison, no grizzlies and no growth. The ten year old burns are the same except for some minor green growth, the North is unforgiving with its short growing season and takes many decades to initiate a recovery.

Two hundred years ago that was fine as the animals had somewhere else to go, and return in a couple decades. Not anymore with how humans alter the landscape, if this area burns woodland caribou are forced into habitat with roads and seismic cut lines. We have one of the last viable woodland caribou herds in the area and I suspect it will be extinct shortly now. All the regeneration theories are right, but the system has also been drastically changed. Some of the large trees used to actually survive fires of lower intensity, and that was part of the system, now the fires are so intense it's utterly scorched clay left and that's it. I have some video of the fires up here that put it in perspective I should upload, flames four times tree height and moving at an absurd rate. Looks like a real life mordor and you can feel the heat in the cockpit from a kilometre. It's no longer just a natural process, but a storm we've created.
 
skneub said:
That only works if there is a bit left unburned .....

Lookin ugly here in Alberta. ...
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It has that appearance but fires are a natural part of a forest cycle. It renews the undergrowth species of vegetation thats incondusive to canopy enviorments, and the animals love it. Although there is a lot of initial damage, the animals are forced to move around and take up population in surrounding areas. I grew up hunting in a large burn area by Conklin/Lac la Biche. Caribou hunting was awesome, you would see ten moose a day, and the ruffed grouse hunting was top of the list for anywhere in North America.


Logging also has a similar effect to give renaissance to the land, although there is only a healthy amount that the land can sustain both with fires and logging. At the end of the day, nature will prevail. Possibly at a time when humans have long gone.
 
^^your going to need more than a bucket of water for that one! Looks like Dresden 1945!
Maybe that will take care of the pine beetles?
 
Ardent said:
Everyone is focused on the south, but the worst conditions are actually in the far north of the province right now. I'm at 58 degrees here and we're flying around fires like nothing I've ever seen before, literally explosive fires so big the plumes jump right to 30,000' and condense and form rain. I've never witnessed updrafts or burn rates like this before either.

Anyone arguing this is natural hasn't considered how humans are altering climate, nothing like this has happened in longer than the lifespans of the oldest trees up here. We're warmer and drier than ever, and folks are right to point out our fire fighting efforts have allowed a lot of fuel to stockpile. When combined with drier than ever, and warmer than ever conditions thanks to human fueled climate change, we're seeing a perfect storm that is not good for the animals. Three years ago we had a big burn close by, and it's still utterly and completely dead- no moose, no wolves, no bison, no grizzlies and no growth. The ten year old burns are the same except for some minor green growth, the North is unforgiving with its short growing season and takes many decades to initiate a recovery.

Two hundred years ago that was fine as the animals had somewhere else to go, and return in a couple decades. Not anymore with how humans alter the landscape, if this area burns woodland caribou are forced into habitat with roads and seismic cut lines. We have one of the last viable woodland caribou herds in the area and I suspect it will be extinct shortly now. All the regeneration theories are right, but the system has also been drastically changed. Some of the large trees used to actually survive fires of lower intensity, and that was part of the system, now the fires are so intense it's utterly scorched clay left and that's it. I have some video of the fires up here that put it in perspective I should upload, flames four times tree height and moving at an absurd rate. Looks like a real life mordor and you can feel the heat in the cockpit from a kilometre. It's no longer just a natural process, but a storm we've created.
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Are you flyin helo fightin the fires Angus?
Whole lotta respect for that kinda work.
That's a real "big picture" analysis and very hard to argue.
We're hitting mid 40's at home in canim/100 mile but getting pretty regular rain showers in evenings. Living where I live I sure do worry in a fire season like this it's kinda scary. A) we could be utterly trapped here as there is so much fuel in the forests. Working out of town leaves one concerned about the uninsurables like the wife and dogs.
I've never in my 46 years seen a summer like this , nor have I ever seen a winter in the Cariboo of BC so impossibly warm.
Crazy.
 
Nobody is fighting it, considered out of control and no chance of containing it, it will likely burn until heavy fall rains, I was mapping the fire for the customer I'm on contract with. We're mainly keeping watch pending evacuation now, supposed to go check it in half an hour again and see how far it's gone. The little machine I'm flying couldn't do anything even if we wanted to.
 
rookie wildcat said:
Wow. You just don't quit, do you? Millions of elk and bison (buffalo) roamed North America. We slaughtered them to near extinction. Elk Island National Park was started by a half dozen guys in the very early 1900's because they saw there were very few animals left.
And white-tail deer? They were brought here from Britain (that would be AFTER Colonization, wouldn't it?) and they simply exploded as a species. Many colonies were given the Red Stag as a celebratory gift from the crown.
But, yeah, you keep believing your view.
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No. No they weren't.
 
rookie wildcat said:
Wow. You just don't quit, do you? Millions of elk and bison (buffalo) roamed North America. We slaughtered them to near extinction. Elk Island National Park was started by a half dozen guys in the very early 1900's because they saw there were very few animals left.
And white-tail deer? They were brought here from Britain (that would be AFTER Colonization, wouldn't it?) and they simply exploded as a species. Many colonies were given the Red Stag as a celebratory gift from the crown.
But, yeah, you keep believing your view.
Click to expand...

Imported from the UK?
 
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