After the Fire | Harvest & Replant
Thankfully, the Dixie Fire is now 94% contained. We actually had a couple days with almost no smoke, and then the unbelievable happened. While the end was in sight for that historic fire, a woman allegedly and intentionally started a new fire in Redding, CA. Such a surreal situation, it almost seems like it’s fictional, but it is not. We woke up on September 23rd to find out there was a 150-acre fire, the Fawn Fire, burning on the northeast side of Redding, and by the end of our workday, it had grown to over 5000 acres. That’s what the historically dry and hot (add in windy) conditions can do once a fire has started. The Fawn Fire is fully contained, but over 200 structures were damaged or destroyed. So what does Sierra Pacific Industries do to pick up the pieces and turn that scarred land into something good again?
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During the Fire | Foresters & Firefighters
Sierra Pacific actively works to create community awareness through our neighbors, conservation agencies, and firefighters. On high fire danger days, we curtail our woods operations. This year, we closed our forestlands to public access on June 21st, more than two months earlier than last year. “SPI takes its commitment to protecting our forest resources and public safety seriously,” said Andrea Howell, SPI spokesman. “With this year’s extreme drought conditions having substantially increased the risk of wildfire, we have made the difficult decision to close our lands to public access and recreation.” Two weeks later, we closed SPI forestlands in southern Washington.
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Before the Fire | Forest Management
Sierra Pacific Industries (SPI) manages all of our 2.15 million acres sustainably. What does that mean? Sustainable forest management has to keep the balance between three main pillars: ecological, economic, and socio-cultural. Forest management includes measures to protect water quality, biodiversity, wildlife habitat, species at risk, and forests with exceptional conservation value. We replant all areas that we harvest and will be increasing the stand volume for the future. While managing this renewable resource, we are also taking care of the water resources, endangered species, and flora and fauna to ensure the health of all entities of the timberland.
We have a team of about 100 professionals, including registered foresters, botanists, wildlife biologists, and other natural resource professionals tackling the sustainable management of our land in California and Washington. Together they use modern forest management practices to reduce the risk of wildfire without damaging the health of the forest. Actively thinning dense forestland and removing dry brush is key to effective fire prevention. We purposefully give our forests defensible fire space. Our foresters strategically thin spots to help stop the spread of fire – along ridges, near towns, and along major roads. This can give the firefighters clear areas to set up equipment and have a safer zone to work from. These fire breaks are a natural way to help prevent fire from spreading by removing the fuel they need to grow. These thinned areas usually have some trees, and are called "shaded fuel breaks." Many management activities can improve a forests’ resistance to drought and fire. These activities will provide positive carbon sequestration outcomes by improving forest growth rates, and reduce mortality from drought and fire.
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