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Fuel break system underway
By Volney Dunavan
Special to the Sierra Star
The Eastern Madera County Fire Safe Council has
officially started on an ambitious yet necessary fuel break system and
water enhancement program for the foothill area of Madera County.
"Not only will this keep major fire out of the
basin, but will keep fire from going into Mariposa County and the National
Forest," said Roger Simms, the California Department of Forestry
Battalion Chief for Madera, Mariposa and Merced Counties. The entire
project will be done over the next three to four years in conjunction with
CDF.
The first phase, the Crooks Mountain leg, goes the 11.9
miles from Miami Mountain to the Deadwood lookout, and is but a part of
the 32-mile long, 300-foot wide shaded fuel break envisioned for the
future. The first phase began in the Chowchilla River drainage area
because historically, this is where larger fires have started. Included,
of course, is the Harlow fire that went from Nipinnawassee through
Oakhurst in 1961, devastating close to 50,000 acres or the Stumpfield
Mountain/Nelson Cove fire that burned 9,000 acres in 1997 as it headed
toward the town of Mariposa. Located in that basin are many Digger Pines
which burn very fast, so fast indeed that the pitch melts and looks like
it is being sprayed. "We’re also working on evacuation plans,"
said newly elected Madera County District 5 Supervisor Tom Wheeler, who
talked a lot about emergency preparedness as part of his election
campaigning.
The Crooks Mountain portion is being accomplished with
the support of 29 land owners in the area, and has drawn on the expertise
of archaeologists, while keeping an eye on endangered plants and natural
water routes.
"Not only does the fire break benefit the public
in general, but it will improve the wildlife habitat and the watershed by
adding forage for ranchers and increasing water yields by 30
percent," said Bob Buckles, a former CDF captain who now chairs the
EMCFSC. "It will create will turkey habitat," says Keith Swope,
head of the Oakhurst Chapter of the National Wild Turkey Federation,
indicating that the local chapter will be looking at bringing the fowl
into the newly cleaned area. "Weather permitting, the phase will be
completed before the end of the year."
A typical landowner involved in the Crooks Mountain
fire break is Doris Mathison, the daughter of Malcolm Lutz of the Lutz
Ranch in Ahwahnee. The property was purchased from the original
homesteader by her father before the Harlow fire 45 years ago. Cattle is
raised on the 700 acres today. |
Since the property is located in the Chukchansi / Miwok
/ Mono indigenous area, there are ample natural materials for basket
weaving, pine nut jewelry and plant collecting. Mathison marks plants
according to their use for medical purposes, for jewelry or for food.
"All things should be considered," she says
pointing out that the Digger Pine Nuts taste just like the more popular
and more expensive Pinon Pine nuts. "She has a spiritual connection
to the land," commented her neighbor Larry Ballew, whose family has
lived in the Ahwahnee area for generations. Ballew, a retired and
Registered Forester, is on the board of the CRCD.
"The system in general is a plan to tie in many
existing or future fuel break projects," Buckles continued. He cited
the 5 ˝ mile Mudge Ranch fuel break; the Massetti Ranch at the top of
Deadwood which has been reforesting dead areas for fuel reduction since
1987 by spreading seed clover for the deer and then adding young
trees.
Indeed, the Mudge Ranch fuel break can be seen with the
naked eye, going from Deadwood to Road 420. Close to 40 organizations and
landowners have come together as a partnership to make the project work.
Included are the Coarsegold Resource Conservation District, the United
State Forest Service.
"Our system will tie into one that is being
similarly done in Mariposa County under the auspices of the Mariposa Fire
Safe Council and the Mariposa Resource Conservation District. There will
be a continued maintenance program for the fire breaks thereby permitting
a natural savannah to evolve," he said.
Future phases that have already been approved include
going across Teaford Saddle, which will be done in cooperation with the
USFS and private landowners, going over the top of Goat Mountain and
through Bass Lake Annex, and then across the valley to Central Camp Road
where it meets Malum Ridge Road 274. In the works is yet another that will
go from Mountain house to Yosemite National Park up the Highway 41
corridor. This again is through the cooperation of the USFS and private
landowners.
Buckles said that almost a year and a half has gone by
since the actual start of the project until now, when the on-ground work
is being done. Included in that time is the preparation of the
Environmental Impact Statements. Funding has come through California
Proposition 40 and 50 money.
"Ranchers are letting us on their property," said Buckles,
acknowledging that without private landowner cooperation, none of the
project could be done. "The chaparral is so thick it couldn’t be
crawled through, so in addition to a masticator of enormous proportions,
hand crews are working on the brushing." |
