High Sierra Topix

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I am concerned. Slowly, the beautiful Sierra Nevada forests are going to disappear. There will be more asthma and higher health costs. Also, burned forests mean burned soils which become mud flows. It's going to affect everyone.

Westerling said there are likely to be more forest fires, as opposed to chaparral fires, in California in future years. That means more wildlife habitat will be destroyed by fire, humans will be breathing more particulate matter, more homes will be in danger, and the cost of homeowners insurance will continue to rise.

“Under any of the scenarios we’ve looked at, we see increased wildfires in the Sierra Nevada, Southern Cascade and North Coast range forests because their elevation makes them more sensitive to temperature increases.” he said. “It means we are going to have big increases in air pollution emissions from these burning forest fires.”

https://www.sfchronicle.com/news/articl ... 899272.php

Not mentioned with increasing fires is the corresponding poor regeneration rate as after the fire. The burned forests are not recovering back into conifer, but brush.
Active recovery will be needed if you ever want to see the area tree covered again in your lifetime.
Active recovery is salvaging and tree planting. Too many 'activists' oppose salvage logging, thus perpetuating the problem.

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The real problem is USFS is severely underfunded. Congress doesn't think it's a priority to remove the trees. So the trees lie on the ground waiting to burn and then the soil is ruined. A very serious and urgent problem that can easily be solved. Lots of jobs could be created, not just the tree removal and planting, but in the recreational sector i.e. hunting, fishing, etc. Once an area is burned out so badly that nobody wants to visit, the local economy is hit hard as well.

Private landowners can complete a two page emergency salvage plan and start hauling logs while the fire crews are still mopping up. I have personally experienced this.
The USFS has to complete an environmental analysis to salvage log. A single appeal from some Luddite eco-group delays the salvaging until the logs decline in value.
A burned tree has a very short time it is economically feasible to log. Even a frivilous appeal in effect kills the project.
This is a loss to everyone, including the environmental groups and outdoor recreationist. The proceeds from the logging pay not only for reforestation, but also rebuilding trails, wildlife habitat, watershed and fisheries projects. 25% of the proceeds go to the local county earmarked for roads and schools. So killing a salvage logging is also impacting kids education and maintaining the roads you use to get to the trailhead.
Plus, salvaging reduces future fire risk. Not salvaging increases future fire risk.

The alarm bells are ringing and loudly. I was just looking at Maverick's post in the 2018 Fire and Smoke Impact Reports:
http://www.highsierratopix.com/communit ... 05#p137904

I couldn't believe it so I went to the USFS WEbSky v1 viewer Maverick linked to
https://tools.airfire.org/websky/v1/run ... 00/#viewer

and was shocked by what I saw. The articles are coming true especially the one from the LA Times which is in the eighth post on the first page of this thread. If you have the time, I highly urge you to read one of the reports (there are two, one is long, the other short):
https://oehha.ca.gov/climate-change/rep ... a#download

as well as
https://www.drought.gov/drought/califor ... xceptional.

Unfortunately, the Daniel Swain article in my original post is behind a paywall now. But in the second post on this thread, Dave_Ayers linked to Swain's blog which has a free version and more recent entries, so all is good. Except for California which is burning.

It just keeps getting worse (and hotter). We're baking away.

“We are seeing the impacts of climate change now,” said Nina Oakley, regional climatologist for the Western Regional Climate Center in Reno. “This is certainly it. It’s happening.”

July’s exceptional heat puts the state on track to be in the running for the warmest summer on record, exceeding the record broken just last year, said UCLA climate scientist Daniel Swain.

“This is not some fluke. This is part of a sustained trend,” Swain said.

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-m ... story.html

You are going to love the next ice age. This is a normal swing in geologic time.

Thanks for sharing Dave. I find this type of information very interesting.
I hope that the powers that be wake up to the current situation and begin to take some active measures to protect this international treasure that we play in.