Come To Kelowna Guys Here We Go Again

[cap]

CJM91 ---------trust me, the BCFS tried very hard to get permission from the province to do the burns I speak of. You may check various news media concerning same or with any member of BCFS who was posted in the Okanagan at the time. I could offer some highly-placed names here, but it's not the place to do so. This idea and the BCFS asking permission of the Province to do so is old news and almost landed in Court until the Province bowed to political pressure from Mr. Suzuki & Company and his band of ardent followers. It's also along about the same time that some 'well-meaning' idiots decided that putting spikes in trees was the way to curtail men and their chainsaws. Everyone had a lot to say about how it was BCFS interfering with MotherNature and BCFS didn't know what they were talking about, etc., etc. This all came from a man with absolutely no practical, College, University or Professional training in the subject about which he was debating about. I know....it's assumed he has a Doctorate or something in this subject he preaches about, but he doesn't.....check it yourself. He may well-meaning even so and do as he wishes, BUT once he sees that he has been terribly wrong and that people are paying a horrible price for what his political lobbying accomplished, then he should be prepared to help them in any way he can or AT LEAST stand-up and be counted and publicly state that he was wrong and that the Provincial Government and BCFS were correct all along..........but NOTHING. One therefore must assume that he is sorry for nothintg whatsoever because sometimes silence is VERY loud.

 

When I was a little boy just starting Grade school, we were given a short list of definitions one day that we were expected to memorize and learn for class discussion. I remember one to this day and it was:........"THE SPINE - your head sits on one end and your bum sits on the other".

Based on that definition from Grade 1 and Mr. Suzuki's inability to admit a mistake, it would seem that Mr. Suzuki has no spine and that his head and bum are side by side.

[Over-Talk]

There is a difference between pre-scribed burns that remove excess foliage/fuel from the forest during safe spring-time weather, and a back-burn which is a controlled burn that removes fuel before the main fire front reaches that point during an out-of-control forest fire.

 

That are both great tactics for respectively, preventing or controlling large fires.

 

However, if either one gets out of control, the ignition boss gets his hand slapped.

 

During the calm spring and fall months, the prescribed burns will fill the local valleys with smoke and invoke great protests from the public.

During the hot, windy days of summer, back-burns can be hard to predict/control and may not even be attempted.

 

Catch 22

Damned if ya' do, damned if ya' don't.

[cap]

CMJ91 ---------just a short addendum here to what I should have posted with the above.

 

There is an extremely large area of virgin forest judt south of the Ft. St. James, BC area. It is massive and the spruce budworm has taken a horrendous toll on a massive amount of beautiful forest. BCFS and a host of logging firms all saw this taking place a long, long time ago and pleaded to be allowed to make roads into the area to be able to get at and truck-out the valuable, marketable timber therein. It's an area that basically spans a very, very large area, but is invisible to the media-conscious public eye.

 

Plans were made and roads planned into it's interior and THEN Mr. Suzuki 'and friends' found out what was planned and how the s.o.b. logging companies, their owners and the money and tax-gauging Provincial government were going to 'rape' Mothernature once again. They put enough political pressure on the government that all plans were curtailed to the point where they wouldn't even allow the various firms to log-out the spruceworm-damaged 'blue timber' that was still marketable in Japan.

 

So how does all that timber stand today? Unless one is totally blind, they know very well where that area is because one can see the orange trees from tens of miles away. Those trees are as dry as a popcorn fart and one of these days a lightning strike will hit. When that day arrives, the path of destruction will make the Kelowna fires seem like an Okanagan Lake weinie roast. Once again, when that day arrives.......and bet on it right now, it will all be brought to the taxpapers of BC via the courtesy of one David Suzuki.......who's seldom, if ever, wrong. When that day arrives, as is normal, the politicians of all stripes will run for cover and probably attempt to dump all the blame for that also onto BCFS if they can possibly arrange it at all.

[KiloMike]

with so many experts on this forum its a wonder why the world isnt a better place haahah hahhahaha

time for some people to get flying i think

[407 too]

Cap, few corrections. The latest oubreak of mountain PINE beetle (not spruce) originated in a wilderness reserve that is west of a line drawn from Burns Lake to Anahim Lake. and being a wilderness reserve, well you are right, no logging allowed.

 

The latest infestation of spruce budworm in that part of the world was in the Bowron valley, east of Prince George and was all logged, visable from satellites of the day, and is now the worlds largest plantation.

 

Japan WILL NOT take beetle killed wood, they feel it is a fungas (correct) that degrades the wood quality and grade (false).

 

For the Japanese, a home is a once in a lifetime adventure, and nothing will do but the brightest and whitest wood. (there is even a separate grade "J-Grade" that is superior to anything you will find at your local lumber yard or home depot).

 

 

All of that aside, the environmentalists should be in favor of removing the beetle killed wood and replanting, as with pine, the cones will not open sitting at the top of the trees, hence no seed source to strart a new forest..... Think of all the CO2 emitted when the wood starts to rot instead of being sequestered away in lumber in some home. ...... Think of all the O2 NOT being produced by these trees, and you have a doubling negative effect.

 

[Icewind]

"Hobby says some of the crucial prevention work has been initiated, but it's not nearly enough to lower the risk in this forest fire season.

 

The problem has been partly economics [and] how much it would take to treat 1.7 million hectares. We would be talking billions, possibly tens or hundreds of billions of dollars," he said."

 

The scope of the mountain pine beetle infestation is immense. You will note that Hobby mentions "possibly tens or hundreds of billions of dollars" and he is talking about dealing with a 1.7 million hectares problem. According to reports from 2007 the mountain pine beetle that was in the stage of "red-attack" covered 9.2 million hectares that year alone. http://www2.news.gov.bc.ca/news_releases_2...0011-000152.htm

 

I doubt if this problem could have been 'solved' years ago (nobody adequately understood how bad it could get) and it probably cannot be 'solved' now. We are faced with simply mitigating the consequences as best we can.

[212wrench]

Smoke to the east of me now. Looks like its blowing up from the southeast. Wispy not real dense.

[Helilog56]

Hang on boys and girls.....the ride has just begun !!!?????

[rotorheadrob]

2 weeks of mid 30s,I'm with you Bob, hang on it’s gonna explode.

 

I see some squabbling over why fires are burning, if it's good or bad, and whether we should be happy or not when we are paid to work on them.

 

My thoughts are,

 

Fires burn because this is how forests are renewed, the habitat improvement for wildlife, and because nature has a way of killing off the old and unproductive so the new can thrive. When a forest reaches maturity it has deposited a large amount of fuel that is ready to burn, midsummer lightning strikes hit the fuel and the renewal process begins. Pine and spruce cones are covered in sap because they are sealed until fire heats them and they open to release their seeds. The next summer a new forest start growing. This has been the cycle for a very long time. We step in, see a lot of uses for lumber and stop letting it burn, at the same time the environmentalists want to stop logging. The forest is dying because it is supposed to, if we don't clear the land mother nature will, because everything has a life span.

 

The pests will die, the old will turn into fertilizer, and a new healthy forest will grow. So we have to have one or the other, let it burn or find a use for it. The simple fact is it can't stay there forever.

 

We have stopped the natural cycle and everyone has a side to pick, the simple fact of the matter is nature will fix the beetle problem because we didn't act as caretakers and log it all off when it started, but then again if you are on the other side we would have to let it burn,

 

I'm so confused my head hurts.

 

To all crews on fires, remember to be safe, they are only trees and they are designed by nature to burn.

 

The fires we put out save property and live, we are working in a system that the public has voted for, when the public wants us to stop they will vote for someone who says stop. Then we will have to find a new way to get our kicks. Mine would be watching all the forest fires on CNN!

 

 

Rob

[Over-Talk]

By looking at the GFA map, it is obvious the Pacific High has parked itself off the Washington coast.

This usually happens every late-June and through July. The few wet systems that can penetrate into it are usually dried-out by the time they get over the Coast Mountains.

This gives the Interior of BC the long, hot, dry summers that tourists love.

 

A NavCanada site concerning BC weather trends says "Summer in this area is noted for the incursion of the Pacific High and the development of hot and dry weather. The weather tends to be dry and sunny with late afternoon or evening thunderstorms occurring mainly along the ridges. Eventually, the Pacific High does break down and, when this happens, it is common for

widespread thunderstorms to develop as cooler, moist air begins to move into the area."

 

This breakdown of the high usually occurs in August, and that's when the Interior of BC gets its worst lightning. (Though BC also gets a lot of lightning in the unstable spring weather of May, the forests are still damp then).

The forests will be really toasty-dry by August if these present temperatures continue.

Amazingly, Vancouver Island is even hotter than the Okanagan right now.

 

The big Kelowna fire of 2003 was started by lightning on August 16th.

The Salmon Arm fire of 1998 was around August 10th, as were the Squamish/Pemberton fires of 1990, and the Kootenay/Canal flats fires of 1985.

 

Maybe the lightning won't even happen this year.....that wouldn't be a first.

 

Stay tuned.........It ain't over yet !!!

 

 

 

http://www.navcanada.ca/ContentDefinitionF.../bc/3-BC31E.PDF