I hate to be a killjoy, but I'm reminded that fires caused by nature are not always part of a natural cycle. I'm referring to the fires of 2000 in Mesa Verde. As I understand it, rangers are somewhat baffled why several large burn areas are showing no evidence of recovery. I was recently visiting the area and indeed it is a very sad sight. The Mesa Verde fights are almost always from lighting strikes since it is home to the most lightning strikes per year in the US. I just find it fascinating that we tend to assume that nature always works in its own best interest. Maybe it is part of Gould's punctuated equilibrium theory and this is nature simply forcing an evolutionary leap. Fun to think about.
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@john All fires caused by nature are part of the natural cycle even if we dont understand it.
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@john I try to avoid using 'natural' and 'unnatural' when it comes to fire because humans and fire have been dancing together for millenia. However, I'm wondering if the area you speak of could have experienced decades of fire suppression (by humans) before the lightening fire came through. These tend to be more severe and harder for the forest to bounce back from due to decades of fuel buildup, but I'm assuming the rangers had considered that possibility.
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So many people are nearly overcome (intellectually, at least) by anxieties and dark predictions of impending doom that are based on a) a simple lack of understanding about the world out there, and b) the stories told (and repeated) by advocacy groups.
To understand the natural world you need to observe it in all seasons, all weather, over many years, through good times and bad. You'll learn that everything always changes. (I've seen the pine barrens on Long Island change just in my lifetime. They're now mostly oak.) And in that process of change there is a remarkable stability.
To understand advocacy organisations you just need to know that their primary issue is fund-raising. Scare tactics work better than reasoned arguments.
The question that bugs me is "why does 100% of the scientific community agree with the doomsters". Scientists almost never agree about anything. It takes many decades for even the simplest consensus to form, and then it immediately starts to fall apart. Just the fact that they're all in agreement about the impending end of our world makes me very suspicious.
So it's heartening to see such a reasonable (and lovely) story about the workings of nature when no one is watching.
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@laurence it HAS taken many decades for there to be a scientific semi-consensus about our climate and that it is changing at an accelerating rate. Should we as individuals notice the record breaking statistics is a psychological matter, for sure. As the economist Mr Keynes has been quoted: "in the end we're all dead"
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@laurence said: "To understand the natural world you need to observe it in all seasons, all weather, over many years, through good times and bad. You'll learn that everything always changes."
Too true. He's describing climatologists and ecologists, by the way. And they're seeing more and more trees in forests in the northwest of North America killed as pine beetles, able to survive increasingly warm winters, are moving north.
Species that depend on living on the edge of oceans are naturally responding, too, as the seas rise again, for the first time in millennia. Cold-water fish and crustaceans are moving polewards in oceans, or just dying out in warming freshwater lakes and rivers.
Yes, nature is amazing and life is persistent. There will be life here when humans are gone (which I'm speciesist enough to hope is a good long time away).
But humans and everyone else will be spending the near-term (geologically speaking) future responding to many changes under way, as the planet responds naturally to very rapid releases of greenhouse gas.
The responses (more ocean, less ice, heavier downpours, etc.) will be nature doing what it's done in the past when greenhouse gases rose sharply. The only differences this time are there's human civilization, which will be forced to respond to what I'll just call a biologically-induced boost in greenhouse gases.
The observations Laurence wanted prove all of this, despite advocacy groups trying to tell us we're not causing big changes.
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Forests have evolved mechanisms to recover from fires in many ways. But there is also the devastation from the economic damage to the human infrastructures like homes, businesses, rivers and lakes. Ecosystems re-establish themselves in different ways but will we adapt and re-configure how humans live and manage forests? I'm skeptical, especially in the era of Trump.
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It would be interesting to see a comparison to the behavior of western forests to the Pine Barrens because what I have seen in my reading suggests it may be somewhat different in the west.
Because of long term fire suppression and other factors, some of the western fires have burned so hot that the living parts of the soil itself are severely damaged. That and the drought cycles that are part of much of the western United States that can make it difficult for the forest to re-establish itself.
Just remember: New Jersey is not New Mexico and the Carolinas are not California.
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This is great news. Another example of this is out on Long Island at the Westhampton Airport, across from the Air National Guard Base. Back in the 90s the pines burned-- today they're all back.
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And as Patti Smith said: “The storm that brings harm also makes fertile.”
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Book
Title: The Pine Barrens
Author: John McPhee
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A wonderful article on the self-restauration powers of nature. Similar phenomena have been reported on oceanic islands, created by volcanic eruptions or devastated by them. Repopulation is rapid, by marine shore organisms and by land plants, either transported by wind or carried by birds.
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Fifty years ago, my family and I visited Yellowstone. Only time I've ever been there.
And my! What a variety of rangers they had. One of them, at least, had a rare gift of comedy. He could make us laugh. He DID make us laugh. Often.
That same guy, I believe (a slightly older man), talked to us about forest fires. The received wisdom (he said) was--forest fires were BAD. You see that telltale plume of smoke--you rush over with your equipment--
--and stamp it out.
NO MORE! he told us. No. Such wisdom, he went on, simply made for very old--senile--decrepit forests. When younger, greener forests might be desirable.
And, of course, many forest fires are simply sparked off by lightning. Nature's own way (as it were) of trimming the waste. Jettisoning the old. Fostering the new.
Which leads to the thought:
How wonderful nature is! Just the sight of those Jersey pine barrens brings an ache to my heart. As I remember driving to the Jersey shore in bygone days.
And trees in general! Do you experience this? A perceptible LIFTING of the spirits when you drive by trees--woods--groves.
I do. All the time. Makes me think of the Romans. Credibile est illi numen inesse loco says Ovid of a patch of woods. "You would believe a god inhabited the place."
But I believe in God--not gods.
And so--
--THANK YOU, LORD--
--for trees--
--and everything else.
Thank you.
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@Susan Fitzwater
Me, I "believe in trees, just Yoko and trees..."
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Thank you for this story. I live in Portland, Oregon, which was choked with smoke from western fires for much of August. Between that and Trump's senseless, climate-denying fire and fury, it was a depressing end to summer. This story gives me hope, just like my dreams of a winter impeachment.
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I shudder to think how close my home state came to allowing development in the Pine Barrens years ago. I consider it NJ's greatest natural treasure. Not to mention the source of drinking water for many of us in South Jersey. David Scott Kessler is making a documentary about the Barrens (I have no affiliation with him or the film). http://www.pinebarrensfilm.com/
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I grew up in the area, so have watched this all my life. Due to limited nutrients in the sandy soil, most pitch pines are stunted, ergo the name, Pine Barrens. In my experience, fires in the Barrens tends to kill oaks.
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The New Jersey Pine Barrens are a very interesting subject in many ways. They have an unusual history and biology. John McPhee wrote a wonderful book about this unique landscape; reading this article reminds me that it is time to reread it and plan a spring visit to this patch of the Garden State.
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Well written, similar to findings abour recovery from fires near Old Faithful in Yellowstone years ago. Original fears proved groundless as natural cycle of recovery took place.
What was learned was that preventing fires until forest was heavily overgrown leads to extremely hot fire and results in slow recovery.
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Fires are a natural and healthy part of the forest ecosystem. It has always baffled me why we spend billions of dollars and hundreds of lives fighting forest fires. Let them burn. If someone made the mistake of building a home in the path of one, the home can be rebuilt.
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The mysteries and splendor of Nature. Thanks for a fascinating article!
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I especially love that the endangered skipper has benefited.
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This inspiring story of renewal, which to many may seem quite natural, nevertheless offers tremendous hope for our battered world .
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I love that you showed all of the recovery photos. Most people think once the forest burns it is lost, but our pitch pine forests are fire-adapted, bounce back super fast and 'need' fire to reproduce. Sometimes I wonder if pitch pines are the oldest organisms on Earth, because it is so hard to kill them. Someone needs to look at those roots and age them somehow!
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Fires are part of the natural cycle of life in the temperate parts of the world, such as the U.S., China and Western Europe. As the article describes, secondary plants and ground vegetation renew themselves pretty quickly after the fire. Even in hardwood forests, such as the Appalachian Mountains, the fire may kill older trees but this allows younger, healthier trees of the same species to replace them. The real danger is when humans build houses or buildings too close to the forested areas. This has been a serious problem I the Southern Appalachians and in Western states in recent years.
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