AFTER THE FIRES WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

 We know all the fires will end when the winter rains arrive, then what?   Think of all the reforestation and restoration work that needs to be done on all the burned over lands and forests.    There is not enough tree nurseries and planting stock or the people willing and able to plant it all in a year or two.    It could take five to ten years to have nursery stock ready to plant the millions of acres destroyed by wildfires just from this year, not to think of future fires.   With a warming climate it will take a diverse species of trees to survive  the longer and drier summers.   There will be some natural reforestation of some species along with native plants and invasive species way before any nursery stock is planted on many burned over areas.   The ecosystem will not be what is was prior to the fires on many of theses sites.  In many places, especially at lower elevations that have not burned yet the ecology is changing now due to climate change.   Many conifer forests at these lower elevations will become hardwood forests or oak woodlands in the future.  

One big threat after fire is the loss of  the soils vital to any kind of regrowth.   According to a soil scientist I knew when I worked on the Siskiyou National Forest, said it takes 100 years to produce one inch of top soil.   Aerial grass seeding is one options to prevent soil erosion if the seed germinates in a timely manner depending on needed rainfall.   If heavy rains come early much of the exposed top soil could wash away into the streams and rivers below from the steep slopes of many of the burned over areas.  There could be the potential for flooding in the low lands and valleys with rapid runoff during peak flows, not to speak of the damage to the fisheries resource.   The greatest threat will be to the watersheds that we all depend on for recreation, domestic use and our food. 

It may take us all, the young and the not so young to do what needs to be done for our survival in the near future.