Video about norcal forests

[Daveroo]

This is from Juan Brown,there is some political base to it from the arguments on the youtube page,but i didnt hear Juan say anything bad...anyway..have a watch,hes not an "authority" but he lays out the California fire situation pretty damned well.

[Dangerousdave26]

Nicely done

[wombat666]

The ANZAC crews turn up on our International news service on a regular basis.
Their main concerns are the terrain and the apparent lack of control over where residential building is permitted, coupled with a lack of basic fire prevention around semi urban areas.
We have had problems (and will continue to do so) when people build in rural locations without considering fire prevention and containment.
The very recent fires in Greece are a perfect example of how not to plan building permits in an obvious fire area.
As for 'Global Warming' (avoiding the politics please) the very recent Scandinavian fires drive home the fact that it is here and is real.
Living in a National Park as we do requires precautions, clearing ground fuel and timber debris is part of our normal routine, all our structures are equipped with external soaker systems which are fed by several water storage sources.
The land around our home is cleared at least 100+ metres from any flammable timber, all within National Park regulations.
Finally, if it comes to a worst case scenario, we have several exits.
We are members of the local CFA, a volunteer organisation that has been part of the Australian rural scene for decades, I say 'we' as Sofie is more use as a Doctor than me, I'm just another grunt.

The commentary in that video is reasonable up to a point, just a bit right wing.
Timber logging is obsolete and can't be trusted to spend money on clearing brush out of their forests.
The core problem lies with residents who have built in danger zones without regard for responsible precautions.
Unfortunately we can't legislate against stupidity.

[Daveroo]

that all makes sense,but logging cleans the forest floor quite good,and we do have laws that are in place to clean and clear around your home,its just that those laws cant be enforced for some reason,the USA has a long standing thing about violating a persons rights,they tried fining people for a time,people cried loudly about it being unfair ,these same people cried even louder a few fire seasons later when they lost their homes due to lack of personal clean up,and blamed the fire fighters for "allowing" the homes to burn,but thats all in the laws,if you dont do the property clearing and fire prevention,your home wont be protected,they just drive past it.back to Juan's video,he showed that under-story,which is real bad,that was 5-6 feet tall ,ive seen it worse in the Tahoe national forest earlier this year,there was "ground clutter" that stood a full 12 feet high,thats all tinder dry and just waiting to addd to a so called fire storm,if this area was allowed to be logged,all that under-story would have been cleaned up,tractors clean that area just moving around,even when using the new cutters.

one comment you made..logging is obsolete.whats that mean? how else are you going to timber harvest for simple things like homes,or paper products?.

[Naismith]

What doesn't get international coverage is the fires up here in BC No celebrities to worry about and not as populated as CA of course but still devastating.

http://bcfireinfo.for.gov.bc.ca/hprS...Statistics.asp

[wombat666]

one comment you made..logging is obsolete.whats that mean? how else are you going to timber harvest for simple things like homes,or paper products?.

Dave,
One of the best timber replacements that is mostly overlooked is compressed Bamboo.
We used it in a previous home we built in conjunction with a steel frame, and it is stronger than most conventional timber products, the panels we had were impregnated with flame retardant, and the cost (at the time) was more than competitive.
Bamboo grows at a prodigious rate, requires little agricultural maintenance and the resulting building panels are consistent in strength, appearance and texture.
As for paper products, recycling 'used' paper is the way to go.


And N, we hear quite a lot of news covering fires on the International scene, probably because as a Nation we are very aware of bush fires.
Already the Australian fire season has kicked off, earlier than usual but not unexpected.

[huub vink]

What doesn't get international coverage is the fires up here in BC No celebrities to worry about and not as populated as CA of course but still devastating.

http://bcfireinfo.for.gov.bc.ca/hprS...Statistics.asp

Not completely true. My colleague comes from Penticton BC and most of her relatives live in that area. So the bush fires get a lot of attention here in our offices

Cheers,
Huub