Controlled burn - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Controlled or prescribed burning, also known as hazard reduction burning or Swailing is a technique sometimes used in forest

Forest

A forest, also referred to as a wood or the woods, is an area with a high density of trees. As with cities, depending where you are in the world, what is considered a forest may vary significantly in size and have various classification according to how and what of the forest is composed...

management

Management

Management in all business and organizational activities is the act of getting people together to accomplish desired goals and objectives using available resources efficiently and effectively...

, farming, prairie restoration

Prairie Restoration

Prairie restoration is an ecologically friendly way to restore some of the prairie land that was lost to industry, farming and commerce. For example, the U.S...

or greenhouse gas

Greenhouse gas

A greenhouse gas is a gas in an atmosphere that absorbs and emits radiation within the thermal infrared range. This process is the fundamental cause of the greenhouse effect. The primary greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere are water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and ozone...

abatement. Fire

Fire

Fire is the rapid oxidation of a material in the chemical process of combustion, releasing heat, light, and various reaction products. Slower oxidative processes like rusting or digestion are not included by this definition....

is a natural part of both forest and grassland ecology

Ecology

Ecology is the scientific study of the relations that living organisms have with respect to each other and their natural environment. Variables of interest to ecologists include the composition, distribution, amount , number, and changing states of organisms within and among ecosystems...

and controlled fire can be a tool for forester

Forester

250px|thumb|right|Foresters of [[Southern University of Chile|UACh]] in the [[Valdivian forest]]s of San Pablo de Tregua, ChileA forester is a person who practices forestry, the science, art, and profession of managing forests. Foresters engage in a broad range of activities including timber...

s. Hazard reduction or controlled burning is conducted during the cooler months to reduce fuel buildup and decrease the likelihood of serious hotter fires. Controlled burning stimulates the germination

Germination

Germination is the process in which a plant or fungus emerges from a seed or spore, respectively, and begins growth. The most common example of germination is the sprouting of a seedling from a seed of an angiosperm or gymnosperm. However the growth of a sporeling from a spore, for example the...

of some desirable forest tree

Tree

A tree is a perennial woody plant. It is most often defined as a woody plant that has many secondary branches supported clear of the ground on a single main stem or trunk with clear apical dominance. A minimum height specification at maturity is cited by some authors, varying from 3 m to...

s, thus renewing the forest. Some cones

Conifer cone

A cone is an organ on plants in the division Pinophyta that contains the reproductive structures. The familiar woody cone is the female cone, which produces seeds. The male cones, which produce pollen, are usually herbaceous and much less conspicuous even at full maturity...

, such as sequoia

Sequoiadendron

Sequoiadendron giganteum is the sole living species in the genus Sequoiadendron, and one of three species of coniferous trees known as redwoods, classified in the family Cupressaceae in the subfamily Sequoioideae, together with Sequoia sempervirens and...

and serotinous require heat from fire to open cones to disperse seeds.

In industrialized countries, controlled burning is usually overseen by fire control authorities for regulations and permits. The party responsible must delineate the intended time and place. Obtaining a permit may not limit liability if the fire burns out of control.

Back burning

Back burning is a way of reducing the amount of flammable material during a bushfire by starting small fires along a man made or natural firebreak

Firebreak

A firebreak is a gap in vegetation or other combustible material that acts as a barrier to slow or stop the progress of a bushfire or wildfire. A firebreak may occur naturally where there is a lack of vegetation or "fuel", such as a river, lake or canyon...

in front of a main fire front. It is called back burning because the small fires are designed to 'burn back towards the main fire front'. The basic reason for back burning is so that there is little material that can burn when the main fire reaches the burnt area. The firebreaks that may be used to start a line of fires along could be a river, road or a bulldozed clearing etc.

Forest use

Another consideration is the issue of fire prevention

Fire prevention

Fire Prevention is a function of many fire departments. The goal of fire prevention is to educate the public to take precautions to prevent fires, and be educated about surviving them. It is a proactive method of reducing emergencies and the damage caused by them. Many fire departments have a Fire...

. In Florida

Florida

Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...

, during the drought in 1998, catastrophic wildfire

Wildfire

A wildfire is any uncontrolled fire in combustible vegetation that occurs in the countryside or a wilderness area. Other names such as brush fire, bushfire, forest fire, desert fire, grass fire, hill fire, squirrel fire, vegetation fire, veldfire, and wilkjjofire may be used to describe the same...

s burned numerous homes. But forestry managers in the Florida Division of Forestry noted that the underlying problem was previous cessation of controlled burning, resulting from complaints by homeowners

NIMBY

NIMBY or Nimby is an acronym for the phrase "not in my back yard". The term is used pejoratively to describe opposition by residents to a proposal for a new development close to them. Opposing residents themselves are sometimes called Nimbies...

. Each year additional leaf

Leaf

A leaf is an organ of a vascular plant, as defined in botanical terms, and in particular in plant morphology. Foliage is a mass noun that refers to leaves as a feature of plants....

litter and dropped branches increased the likelihood of a hot and uncontrollable fire.

Controlled burns are sometimes ignited using a tool known as the driptorch

Driptorch

A driptorch is a tool used in wildfire suppression, controlled burning, and other forestry applications to intentionally ignite fires.The driptorch consists of a canister for holding fuel with a handle attached to the side, a spout with a loop to prevent fire from entering the fuel canister, a...

, which allows a steady stream of flaming fuel to be directed to the ground as needed. Variations on the driptorch can be used such as the helitorch, which is mounted on a helicopter

Helicopter

A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by one or more engine-driven rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forwards, backwards, and laterally...

, or other improvised devices such as mounting a driptorch-like device on the side of a vehicle

Vehicle

A vehicle is a device that is designed or used to transport people or cargo. Most often vehicles are manufactured, such as bicycles, cars, motorcycles, trains, ships, boats, and aircraft....

. A pyrotechnic device known as a fusee

Flare (pyrotechnic)

A flare, also sometimes called a fusee, is a type of pyrotechnic that produces a brilliant light or intense heat without an explosion. Flares are used for signalling, illumination, or defensive countermeasures in civilian and military applications...

can be used for ignition in nearby fuels while a Very pistol

Flare gun

A flare gun is a firearm that launches flares. It is typically used for signalling, as distress signalling, at sea or from the ground to aircraft...

can be for fuels farther away.

For the burning of slash

Slash (logging)

Slash, or slashings, is a forestry term that refers to coarse and fine woody debris generated during logging operations or through wind, snow or other natural forest disturbances. Slash generated during logging operations may increase fire hazard and some North American states have passed laws...

, waste

Waste

Waste is unwanted or useless materials. In biology, waste is any of the many unwanted substances or toxins that are expelled from living organisms, metabolic waste; such as urea, sweat or feces. Litter is waste which has been disposed of improperly...

materials left over from logging

Logging

Logging is the cutting, skidding, on-site processing, and loading of trees or logs onto trucks.In forestry, the term logging is sometimes used in a narrow sense concerning the logistics of moving wood from the stump to somewhere outside the forest, usually a sawmill or a lumber yard...

, there are several types of controlled burns. Broadcast burning is the burning of scattered slash over a wide area. Pile burning is gathering up the slash into piles before burning. These burning piles may be referred to as bonfire

Bonfire

A bonfire is a controlled outdoor fire used for informal disposal of burnable waste material or as part of a celebration. Celebratory bonfires are typically designed to burn quickly and may be very large...

s. High temperature

Temperature

Temperature is a physical property of matter that quantitatively expresses the common notions of hot and cold. Objects of low temperature are cold, while various degrees of higher temperatures are referred to as warm or hot...

s can harm the soil

Soil

Soil is a natural body consisting of layers of mineral constituents of variable thicknesses, which differ from the parent materials in their morphological, physical, chemical, and mineralogical characteristics...

, damaging it physically

Hydrophobic soil

Hydrophobic soil - soil that is hydrophobic - causes water to collect on the soil surface rather than infiltrate into the ground. Wild fires generally cause soils to be hydrophobic temporarily, which increases water repellency, surface runoff and erosion in post-burn sites...

, chemically

Chemical change

Chemical changes occur when a substance combines with another to form a new substance or, alternatively, decomposes into two or more different substances. These processes are called chemical reactions and , in general, are not reversible except by further chemical reactions...

or sterilizing

Sterilization (microbiology)

Sterilization is a term referring to any process that eliminates or kills all forms of microbial life, including transmissible agents present on a surface, contained in a fluid, in medication, or in a compound such as biological culture media...

it. Broadcast burns tend to have lower temperatures and will not harm the soil as much as pile burning, though steps can be taken to treat the soil after a burn. In lop and scatter burning, slash is left to compact over time, or is compacted with machinery. This produces a lower intensity fire, as long as the slash is not packed too tightly. However, soil may be damaged if machinery is used to compress the slash.

Controlled burning reduces fuel

Fuel

Fuel is any material that stores energy that can later be extracted to perform mechanical work in a controlled manner. Most fuels used by humans undergo combustion, a redox reaction in which a combustible substance releases energy after it ignites and reacts with the oxygen in the air...

s, may improve wildlife

Wildlife

Wildlife includes all non-domesticated plants, animals and other organisms. Domesticating wild plant and animal species for human benefit has occurred many times all over the planet, and has a major impact on the environment, both positive and negative....

habitat

Habitat (ecology)

A habitat is an ecological or environmental area that is inhabited by a particular species of animal, plant or other type of organism...

, controls competing vegetation, improves short term forage for grazing, improves accessibility, helps control tree

Tree

disease

Disease

A disease is an abnormal condition affecting the body of an organism. It is often construed to be a medical condition associated with specific symptoms and signs. It may be caused by external factors, such as infectious disease, or it may be caused by internal dysfunctions, such as autoimmune...

, and perpetuates fire dependent species. In mature Longleaf Pine

Longleaf Pine

Pinus palustris, commonly known as the Longleaf Pine, is a pine native to the southeastern United States, found along the coastal plain from eastern Texas to southeast Virginia extending into northern and central Florida....

forest, it helps maintain habitat for endangered

Endangered species

An endangered species is a population of organisms which is at risk of becoming extinct because it is either few in numbers, or threatened by changing environmental or predation parameters...

Red-cockaded Woodpecker

The Red-cockaded Woodpecker is a woodpecker found in southeastern North America.- Description :About the size of the Northern Cardinal, it is approximately 8.5 in. long, with a wingspan of about 14 in. and a weight of about 1.5 ounces...

s in their sandhill

Sandhill

A sandhill is a type of ecological community or xeric wildfire-maintained ecosystem. It is not the same as a sand dune. It features very short fire return intervals, one to five years. Without fire, sandhills undergo ecological succession and become more oak dominated.Entisols are the typical...

and flatwoods

Flatwoods

Flatwoods, Pineywoods, Longleaf Pine-Wiregrass Ecosystem refers to an ecological community in the Southeastern coastal plain of North America...

habitats. Fire is also felt to be a crucial element of the recovery of the threatened Louisiana Pine Snake

Louisiana Pine Snake

The Louisiana Pine Snake is a large, nonvenomous constrictor of the Colubridae family. This powerful snake is notable because if its large eggs and small clutch sizes. The Louisiana Pine Snake is indigenous to west-central Louisiana and eastern Texas, where it relies strongly on the Baird's...

in the longleaf pine forests of central Louisiana and eastern Texas. However many scientists disagree with such a simplistic approach, and indicate that each forest must be assessed on its own merit.

Agricultural use

Controlled burns were first used significantly in the Neolithic Revolution

Neolithic Revolution

The Neolithic Revolution was the first agricultural revolution. It was the transition from hunting and gathering to agriculture and settlement. Archaeological data indicates that various forms of plants and animal domestication evolved independently in 6 separate locations worldwide circa...

, i.e. about 9–11,000 years ago at the end of the last ice age when hunter gatherers turned to farming. In the developing world, this is often referred to as slash and burn

Slash and burn

Slash-and-burn is an agricultural technique which involves cutting and burning of forests or woodlands to create fields. It is subsistence agriculture that typically uses little technology or other tools. It is typically part of shifting cultivation agriculture, and of transhumance livestock...

.

In addition to forest management, controlled burning is also used in agriculture. In industrialized nations, it is seen as one component of shifting cultivation

Shifting cultivation

Shifting cultivation is an agricultural system in which plots of land are cultivated temporarily, then abandoned. This system often involves clearing of a piece of land followed by several years of wood harvesting or farming, until the soil loses fertility...

, as a part of field preparation for planting. Often called field burning, this technique is used to clear the land of any existing crop residue as well as kill weeds and weed seeds. Field burning is less expensive than most other methods such as herbicides or tillage but because it does produce smoke and other fire related pollutants, its use is not popular in agricultural areas bounded by residential housing.

In the United States, field burning is a legislative and regulatory issue at both the Federal and state levels of government.

Controversy

In Oregon

Oregon

Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...

, field burning has been widely used by grass

Grass

Grasses, or more technically graminoids, are monocotyledonous, usually herbaceous plants with narrow leaves growing from the base. They include the "true grasses", of the Poaceae family, as well as the sedges and the rushes . The true grasses include cereals, bamboo and the grasses of lawns ...

seed farmers as a method for clearing fields for the next round of planting, as well as revitalizing grasses that require fire in order to grow seed again. The Oregon Department of Environmental Quality

Oregon Department of Environmental Quality

The Oregon Department of Environmental Quality is the chief regulatory agency of the government of the U.S. state of Oregon responsible for protecting and enhancing the state's natural resources and managing sanitary and toxic waste disposal. The agency employs approximately 700 scientists,...

began requiring a permit for farmers to burn their fields in 1981, but the requirements became stricter in 1988 following a multi-car accident in which smoke from field burning near Albany, Oregon

Albany, Oregon

Albany is the eleventh largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon, and is the county seat of Linn County. It is located in the Willamette Valley at the confluence of the Calapooia River and the Willamette River in both Linn and Benton counties, just east of Corvallis and south of Salem. It is...

obscured the vision of drivers on Interstate 5, leading to a 23-car accident in which 5 people died and 37 were injured. This resulted in more scrutiny of field burning and proposals to ban field burning in the state altogether.

Following extensive research and advocacy from the Western Environmental Law Center

Western Environmental Law Center

The Western Environmental Law Center is a nonprofit public interest law firm that works to protect and restore western wildlands and advocates for a healthy environment on behalf of communities throughout the West....

, in 2007 the Lane County Board of Commissioners and the Lane County Board of Health decided to formally urge the state’s Environmental Quality Commission (EQC) to order a two-year moratorium of open field burning in the Willamette Valley in order to protect Oregonians from smoke inhalation from burning grass seed fields.

Heathland use

The controlled burning or Swailing of heathland

Heath (habitat)

A heath or heathland is a dwarf-shrub habitat found on mainly low quality acidic soils, characterised by open, low growing woody vegetation, often dominated by plants of the Ericaceae. There are some clear differences between heath and moorland...

is used in the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

and other countries as a conservation

Conservation ethic

Conservation is an ethic of resource use, allocation, and protection. Its primary focus is upon maintaining the health of the natural world: its, fisheries, habitats, and biological diversity. Secondary focus is on materials conservation and energy conservation, which are seen as important to...

tool. In Scotland it is known as Muirburn. Often it is used as a tool for creating fire breaks to reduce the risk of dangerous outbreaks but is also an important mechanism for preventing succession to woodier vegetation and plays an important role in the life cycle of heather

Ericaceae

The Ericaceae, commonly known as the heath or heather family, is a group of mostly calcifuge flowering plants. The family is large, with roughly 4000 species spread across 126 genera, making it the 14th most speciose family of flowering plants...

species.

Greenhouse gas abatement

Controlled burns on Australian savanna

Savanna

A savanna, or savannah, is a grassland ecosystem characterized by the trees being sufficiently small or widely spaced so that the canopy does not close. The open canopy allows sufficient light to reach the ground to support an unbroken herbaceous layer consisting primarily of C4 grasses.Some...

s can result in an overall reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. One working example is the West Arnhem Fire Management Agreement, started to bring "strategic fire management across 28000 square kilometres (10,810.9 sq mi) of Western Arnhem Land" to partially offset greenhouse gas emissions from a liquefied natural gas

Liquefied natural gas

Liquefied natural gas or LNG is natural gas that has been converted temporarily to liquid form for ease of storage or transport....

plant in Darwin

Darwin, Northern Territory

Darwin is the capital city of the Northern Territory, Australia. Situated on the Timor Sea, Darwin has a population of 127,500, making it by far the largest and most populated city in the sparsely populated Northern Territory, but the least populous of all Australia's capital cities...

, Australia. Deliberately starting controlled burns early in the dry season results in a mosaic of burnt and unburnt country which reduces the area of stronger, late dry season fires.

External links

BBC News Devon Swailing
Northern Arizona University
Tall Timbers Research Center and Land Conservancy
U.S. National Park Service Prescribed Fire Policy
Savanna Oak Foundation article on controlled burns
http://www.epa.gov/oecaagct/tburn.html United States Environmental Protection Agency
United States Environmental Protection Agency
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is an agency of the federal government of the United States charged with protecting human health and the environment, by writing and enforcing regulations based on laws passed by Congress...

(EPA) article concerning air pollution
Air pollution
Air pollution is the introduction of chemicals, particulate matter, or biological materials that cause harm or discomfort to humans or other living organisms, or cause damage to the natural environment or built environment, into the atmosphere....

consequences of controlled burning
The Nature Conservancy's Global Fire Initiative
Strategic fire management West Arnhem Land Fire Abatement Project, Tropical Savannas Cooperative Research Centre
Fire management and greenhouse gas emissions West Arnhem Land Fire Abatement Project, Tropical Savannas CRC
Fuel Characteristic Classification System (FCCS) for Wildland Fuels
European Commission project: FIRE PARADOX - "Learn to live with fire"
"Controlled burn" from the Global Legal Information Network Subject Term Index

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