[APWG] flammable biomass

[Michael Schenk]

There's been a lot of attention paid to invasive-fueled wildfires out West (and rightly so), but has there been documentation of the fire impact of stilt grass on Eastern forests? I recently threw a mass of dew-soaked green stilt grass on a small wood fire, and it burned like the 4th of July. I'm worried about how much more intense a ground fire will be with stilt grass present. 

On an associated note, is anyone harvesting stilt grass for fuel? 

Mike

Message: 2
Date: Fri, 26 Sep 2008 16:41:43 -0000 (UTC)
From: "Craig Dremann - Redwood City Seed Company" <Craig at astreet.com>
Subject: [APWG] Measuring flammable biomass & Preseeding for fires?
To: apwg at lists.plantconservation.org
Cc: craig at astreet
Message-ID: <1407.66.81.74.169.1222447303.squirrel at fast2.astreet.com>
Content-Type: text/plain;charset=iso-8859-1

Dear All,

I have been out measuring Central California flammable biomass for several
native species and for a couple of widspread exotic species, at
http://www.ecoseeds.com/flames.html

I am really shocked when you compare the little bitty bit of flammable
biomass of the full-sun native with the exotics that replaced them.  No
wonder we have such a bad time with fires in this State?

It seems that the native ecosystems in full sun, evolved to limit the
spread of fire, by producing a bare minimal amount of dry biomass and by
growing in clumps, with spaces in between the bunchgrasses.

Some of the native species are still green, even after two years of
exceptional drought, and do not have any flammable biomass.  Other species
have the same amount of biomass, as if you thinly scattered only three
small cut bales of hay per acre.

I think if we could convert areas in California and the arid West from
exotic cover, back to original native cover, that might be very useful for
limiting fires in the future.

For example, sowing the hundreds of firebreaks that were made during the
over 2,000 fire that were fought in California in 2008, back to the local
natives, then those firebreaks may be able to permanently function in that
fashion.

I call this process "Preseeding natives for Fire control."

I would be very interested, to see the flammable biomass measurements from
other parts of the arid West, of both the exotics and the local native
understory?

Sincerely,  Craig Dremann, Redwood City, CA (650) 325-7333