Word: forested
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...them; very little wildlife is destroyed. With permafrost so close to the surface, it often takes trees 70 years to reach a diameter of four inches. They are "useful" only for pulp, but the nearest roads for a hypothetical pulp mill are often hundreds of miles from any particular forest. The fires' contribution to air pollution is only temporary, and the grass and moss burn so in- completely that humans' fire trenches may cause as much erosion as the fires...
...fact, forest fires are actually beneficial in a way. They remove the climax vegetation--the tall aspen and spruce--and open up the land for other types of vegetation. Black bears fatten themselves for the winter on blueberries growing in old burns, and other animals also depend on the low shrubs and grasses that can only gain a toehold after a burn...
...FIRST glance, Smokey Bear seems to have a firmer position in the "lower 48," where timber plantations and city watersheds seem threatened by fires. However, some recent research from California has hinted that even there, government forest fire policy may need radical revision. Forestry experts have found that large forest fires are so hot that they destroy small roots, organic matter, and essential soil nitrates to a depth of several inches, while a series of small, controlled fires does not reach such high temperatures and does not inflict such severe damage...
...moment, whenever a fire is spotted, it is immediately extinguished. This policy allows large quantities of leaf litter to accumulate on the forest floor, and when the inevitable fire does strike, this excess fuel not only raises the temperature beyond the soil's danger point but also produces a much harder blaze to control. A series of smaller fires in timber and range lands might be better for the long-term benefit of the soil...
...native villagers start their own fires if their village crew has been idle during the fire season. Last year, the Federal Government spent $9.2 million in Alaska alone to suppress fires, most of which were started by lightning, and many of which occurred in distant wilderness areas. If controlled forest fires really are as useful as some biologists think and if the loss of life and high injury rate among firefighters continues, perhaps it is time to depose Smokey Bear and find some safer way to distribute money to poor frontiersmen.Two firefighters retrieve their axes and packs from a hovering...