W.I.S.E. Fire Tracking

I am loving your coverage of this fire. Honest and funny, plus it is the best info I can find on the web. Living near this fire, that is important to me. The “official” sites offer much of nothing.

Thank you!

Folks in Sunriver should be very wary of the Deschutes NF policies and practices. Over the last ten years the DNF has incinerated over 170,000 acres of old-growth, spotted owl habitat. Sisters, Camp Sherman, and Black Butte have all been evacuated, and more than once.

The DNF does not do restoration forestry. They do not prepare stands for receiving fire. Instead they allow fuels to build up to catastrophic levels and then when lightning strikes, they Let It Burn.

The DNF’s Let It Burn policy is patently illegal. They have never made the slightest effort to consult with area residents whose homes and lives are at stake. Consultations are demanded by environmental laws such as NEPA, ESA, and NHPA, but the DNF is rogue and dismissive of the law.

Sunriver is not safe when lunatics are in charge of the landscape. It astounds me that when so much asset value is threatened, the residents do not take the DNF craziness seriously and instead wait for disaster to happen. If I lived in and/or owned property in Sunriver, I would have led a massive public revolt against the insane and hugely irresponsible USFS and Deschutes NF nutjobs long ago.

It is YOUR life and property that are at stake. It is YOUR landscape that is so poorly managed. YOU must take a stand before all is lost. Perhaps this fire can be a wakeup call, but after so many years of repeated disasters all around you, one would think that Sunriver-ites would have heard the alarm bells by now.

PS — I’m not saying it is all your responsibility personally, Pippi. But it is the responsibility of all the residents in any landscape to take control of their lives, livelihoods, and watersheds, and as a community practice mutually beneficial stewardship. The Federal Government has run amok. They cannot be trusted, except to do the wrong thing constantly. Locals must band together or tragedy will strike again and again.

Hey! I just moved here, from Vermont, two months ago…(where we have quite different stewardship concerns) So this is my first fire. I’m totally unaware of what has gone on as far as forest management, but I hope to become more educated on the goings on here. My neighbor informed me of some public/private forest management program here [sunriver] that apparently is one of the forerunners in the nation. (He just returned from DC presenting the program to whomever it is that you do that for.)

I digress, I’m all for personal responsibility in these matters. Clearly the agencies set up to “manage” situations have dropped the ball.
Obviously, education is needed. And I can not stress that enough.

One very frightening thing for me was it took me many hours (and I like to think of myself as internet savvy) to find out where on earth this fire was.

Again, thanks for doing what it is you do.

Pippi,

You are 100% absolved. I grant you absolution. Not your fault in any way, shape, or form.

Have your neighbor email me his stuff. I would love to look it over. One critical notion regarding fire safety: defensible space must extend to the furthest reaches of the watershed to be effective.

Another important notion: restoration forestry seeks to renovate the historical conditions. In the case of the eastside Cascades, that means open, park-like forests. For thousands of years the First Residents maintained a savanna through regular, frequent, seasonal anthropogenic fire.

They did that to enhance their survival, which included enhancing valuable plants for food and fiber. Numerous excellent fiber plants abounded, and much of the native cultural life revolved around fibers. They were the Fiber People. Beargrass, Indian hemp, iris, sedges, rushes, and various shredded inner barks were essential raw materials to their lifeways and all were maintained by anthropogenic fire.

I tell you that because I notice that you are also a Fiber Person. You are certainly in the right place for that!

The next time I see him, I’ll ask him to pass it along. He is an illusive fellow and I don’t see him very often. Perhaps my fiber studio is too close to his house and he may be scared of what he thinks goes on here… (Joking!)

We could learn a lot from indigenous methods (across the board) if we only took the time. Perhaps doing things the right way is too much work, heh?

And I will accept your absolution on one condition… If at this time next year I’m still singing my same under informed tune; I expect to be tarred and feathered.

Pippi,

Coming up next at SOS Forests [here] is a series of discussions on restoration forestry, including the historical fiber connection. Tune in; you will learn a lot of neat stuff that may apply to your art, in one way or another.

Wonderful! Thank you! I bookmarked that.

~I don’t know exactly what is going on over there today, but I’ve seen now 3 fire choppers headed that way in the past half an hour.

What happened is that the local DNF team was booted off the fire and a regional Type 2 IMT (Incident Management Team) took over. The fire will be contained, controlled and extinguished in a matter of hours, now. Pros are on the job. Sunriver can breathe a sigh of relief.