Yesterday could have been fun. One of what is bound to be many wildfires this summer started up just behind my house, about 45 minutes from where I work. It started ironically right about the time that I was on the phone with a reporter discussing one of Nevada’s greatest environmental threats: fire.
Despite my sideline preaching to the few who will listen, issues such as mercury, arsenic, air pollution from cars, mines and so on, while important, aren’t nearly as critical as the issue of why there are so many wildfires in the state, how the situation came to be as it is and, most critically, what is likely not going to be done about it.
The root of the Great Basin’s wildfires begins with migration westward by white settlers. With them came invasive plant species, particularly cheatgrass. Today, Nevada’s ranges are cheatgrass dominated. Cheatgrass is dormant much of the year until right about now. It greens up for only about a month and quickly becomes nearly as flammable as gasoline the rest of the year.
Hence, wildfires. Millions upon millions of Nevada acres have burned in the last 10 years. Acreages of native plants then convert into monocultures of cheatgrass, which only heightens the likelihood of more fires in the future.
The fires impacting human communities are most often human caused, while the rest are mostly started by lightening. The impacts are numerous and include hits to the economy, air quality, water quality, wildlife, ranching operations, homes and lives. The costs to taxpayers both monetarily and in terms of lost access to resources, although indirect in most cases, is mind-boggling.
Yet there is little outcry from the public unless homes are being burned. Even then, concern is often only expressed when the fires are close to home.
What can be done? Unless billions of dollars are devoted to pre-suppression efforts on a landscape level, not much. Many are trying, however.
My former employer and my current employer came together with various state and federal agencies (at the urging of Resource Concepts, Inc. in Carson City), and presented a forum at the University of Nevada, Reno. Eminent range scientists were gathered to give their recommendations about Nevada’s fire problem, and what can be done, if anything, about it.
The resulting work was just released as a 44-page publication called, “Great Basin Wildfire Forum: The Search for Solutions.” I encourage all to read it.
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