Great idea, isn't it, Chris? Remind us to be careful in the forest.
Smoky's not an eye-deer, Daddy. He's real. He's as real as you and I.
Oh, sure, Chris. Let's go.
For more than half a century, Smoky Bear has been telling us to prevent forest fires, that fires destroy living forests.
But what if he's wrong? What if the biggest and hottest fires are actually the seeds of creation for a rare and magical type of forest in the American West?
Some people believe that intense forest fire is unnatural and are afraid that it destroys wildlife habitat.
But our western forests have been burning regularly for thousands of years.
In fact, high-intensity fires have occurred in these forests for so long that many plants and animals have evolved to depend upon severely burned areas.
Far from harming a forest, intense fires create a unique community of fire-loving plants and animals.
Many creatures need severely burned forests to thrive and have evolved special adaptations for finding and using this habitat.
Dr. Richard Hutto of the University of Montana was one of the first scientists to report the surprising news that many plants and animals reach their greatest numbers in the most heavily burned forests.
Turns out there are some 50 species of birds known to nest in this kind of habitat.
Some, like the American Robin, know where are they more abundant than in this kind of forest.
Other species, like the blackback woodpecker, are fairly restricted to these sorts of conditions.
It's hard to find them anywhere but in early burned forests.
Now we normally think of burned forests as bad events, but clearly they're natural events and critically important for creating an environment like this suitable for a species like the blackback woodpecker.
With strong bills, specialized bone structure, and long sticky tongues, blackback woodpeckers are specially adapted for excavating holes in trees and extracting the beetle larvae.
They also excavate safe, protected nesting cavities in which to raise their chicks.
The blackback woodpecker is now the poster child for severely burned forests.
In the Sierra Nevada of California, scientists place radio tracking devices on blackback woodpeckers to see where they nest and feed.
Blackback woodpeckers reach their highest densities by far in the most severely burned forests and are rare in unburned forests.
So why do these woodpeckers flock to the severely burned forests?
After a fire, and sometimes even during a fire, wood boring beetles are attracted to the burned area where they lay their eggs on freshly burned trees.
The eggs develop into grubs that live inside the rotting wood of the burned trees for up to two years.
These grubs are a super abundant food source for the blackback woodpeckers.
There is now overwhelming scientific evidence that forest fires create important new habitat.
So it may seem counterintuitive to many people, but intense fire in mature forests creates what we call snag forest habitat.
And actually, this is one of the most ecologically rich and biodiverse forest habitat types that we have in the American West.
Unfortunately, despite numerous scientific studies, the United States Forest Service refuses to provide protections for this rare and important habitat.
And they continue to pursue a very aggressive program of post-fire salvage logging.
And basically what they're doing is selling public timber to private logging companies after fires.
Enormous areas are clear cut, thousands of acres, even tens of thousands.
Fire logging removes habitat elements like dead trees and logs, robbing the forest of nutrients needed for regrowth, and eliminating structures that wildlife need as homes where they live and reproduce.
Firefighting and post-fire salvage logging cause harm to soils and wildlife habitat and are not necessary for the protection of human lives and property.
Fire experts, like Jack Cohen at the U.S. Forest Service, have shown definitively that the best way to protect homes and communities from forest fire is to build structures with fire-safe materials
and to remove flammable vegetation within just 100 feet immediately around structures.
We now know that most forests in the American West do not need protection from fire.
But this information is not widely known because it is hidden behind Smoky's persistent message that fire destroys wildlife habitat.
Severely burned forests are every bit as unique, valuable, and biologically rich as our treasured old-growth forests.
Shrubs grow and flowers bloom from the blackened earth and attract legions of insects, which are eaten by many bird species, like black-backed woodpeckers,
all-of-sided flycatchers, mountain bluebirds, lazuli buntings, house wrens, and western woodpewees, as well as many species of bats.
Large mammals like deer and elk gather in severely burned forests to feast upon the nutritious new plant growth.
Small mammals like mice, voles, and gophers proliferate, eating the abundant seeds.
With all these herbivores in the burned forest, it is no surprise that predators also are attracted there.
Even the spotted owl, a bird usually associated with old-growth forests, is often drawn to the most heavily burned areas to forage upon small rodents.
Some trees require fire for their seeds to sprout, like the giant sequoia, which regenerates best after intense fire.
After a fire, the forest naturally begins to regenerate.
Decomposition of dead trees and droppings from fire-loving creatures are natural fertilizers that promote vigorous regrowth of tree saplings and other plants.
Over the next few years, sapling trees grow, heralding the eventual return of a green forest.
When that happens, the fire-loving plants and animals must then leave to seek another place where fire has created anew the burned habitat they require.
The fact that so many plants and animals need severely burned forest tells us that regularly occurring high-intensity fire is a natural and necessary component of a healthy forest.
It seems that smoking needs a different message, that forest fires are the creative seeds of new life.
We need to learn not merely to live with severe fire, but to appreciate its ecological importance by embracing the beauty and vibrancy of severely burned forests.
Together, we can help safeguard all the plants and animals that depend upon fire for life.
Remember, when you're in the forest, you're among friends.
Thank you for watching!
