In the early twentieth century Forest Service Chief Greeley produced an article titled “Paiute Forestry or The Fallacy of Light Burning” sparking controversy throughout land management spheres. Greeley’s article highlighted the stark differences in fire management ideals across the North American landscape at the time. Light fire was labeled by the Forest Service as a destructive nuisance that only served to remove timber volume from forests and render them unproductive. Chief Greeley’s position on the use of light fire as a tool to increase and maintain forest health was that of distaste and disagreement. Greeley’s formal European forestry training did not align with such incendiarism focused tactics and methods for managing forests. To the contrary, Greeley’s management tactics proposed the complete suppression of all wildfires, thus retaining and maintaining heathy stands for future harvest. Fire that was to remain of the landscape should be used solely for site preparation for the establishment of new marketable plantations. Greeley did comprehend that severe fires would occur in climatically conducive regions, however these forests would regenerate more quickly than landscapes experiencing light burning tactics. These utilitarian approaches to forest management drove many of the policies that were put into place during the 1900’s. The Weeks Act of 1911 and in 1935 the development of the 10am rule drove home these conceptions of appropriate forest and fire management. Management practices became increasingly progressive through the later decades of the 1900’s. Modifications to operations and objectives were eventually molded to reflect a more appropriate use of fire to improve forest conditions, resiliency and health. These changes in policy and management were brought to light as the unintended consequences of fire suppression became visible and apparent in North America’s forests.
In the later decades of the 1900’s acts such as the Multiple Use Sustained Yield Act of 1960, the Wilderness Act of 1964 and the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 indicated alterations in public and legislative views of fire on North American landscapes. In addition to these legislative measures, the Leopold Report, produced in 1963, highlighted the need for fire to be returned to fire-dependent environments for proper ecosystem functioning. The National Park Service (NPS) was arguably the first agency to realize the implications of fire’s removal from ecosystems. In 1968 the Sequoia Kings Canyon National Park established the nation’s first fire use program, NPS also notably being the first agency to establish dedicated Wildland Fire Use Modules for conducting and managing resource benefiting fires. These changes in fire management opinions were brought about by a lack in the ability of federal agencies to effectively and efficiently suppress wildfires. Eventually federal agencies such as the Bureau of Land Management and the Forest Service followed suit in applying managed fire to their lands. Fires today are known to play critical roles in providing ecosystem services and allowing stand successional trajectories to progress, ultimately allowing for the development of more complex landscapes.
2 replies on “A comparison of Chief Greeley’s Fire Ideals with Contemporary Fire Management”
This is a really great chronological walkthrough of the fallacy of light burning and its historical context. The legislation you bring up during the 1960s is a great addition to the Leopold Report, and not a factor that I had put much thought into regarding changing fire policy. I like your focus on the Forest Service and how they described light fire as a nuisance for production. It can be easy for me to forget that the Forest Service’s primary goal is timber production, especially during the start of last century. It surprises me that many of these forest managers seem aware of fires role on the landscape, and the anecdotes that areas prone to fire regenerate quickly, but still try to tame wildfire for timber production. The national park service being the first federal agency to largely adopt fire always surprises me due to the nature of the amazing natural sites that they are charged with protecting for the public. It seems that tourists visiting the park would be less likely to after a fire, and also the fact that they receive no visitors during bad fires. The discrepancies between our federal agencies seems more and more concerning. Thanks for sharing your ideas.
Ian, I like your article and the way you spoke of Greeley using a utilitarian approach. In his article it was clear that his primary focus was timber as he refereed to the as “very fine logs” I tried to see his point of through his lens as having fought and survived the big burn of 1910, and being a product of the time where the US was focused on expansion and growth. However, I also feel that he put his credentials as a professional forester on the line by not objectively looking at the use of fire for forest health. There were clearly people at the time that believed it and had some of the same arguments that we see now so solidly based in science.
Sometimes its hard to not judge historic figures by today;s standards.