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Comment by dev_dull | Hacker News Reader

> severe droughts, meaning more dry fuel, as well as more intense heat waves”. The conditions set the stage for more, larger fires throughout the year. The trend will threaten people, property, and natural spaces

It’s funny that we often phrase forest fires as some ecological disaster, when in reality they are a normal and healthy part of a forest. I fact, some seeds won’t even germinate until they’ve been roasted by a forest fire [1].

It’s only now that we live all around and inside them that it’s become our problem.

1. https://www.britannica.com/list/5-amazing-adaptations-of-pyr...

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Also, these are to a large extent not “natural forests”; these forests can be huge areas of human planted forest with vast areas being covered by trees all the same age and size. This could mean it burns faster and recovers slower than a natural forest.

Also in natural land there are natural borders such as wetlands to limit spread, and if those wetlands have been ditched to increase forest area then the reach of the fires will grow.

But you are absolutely right this is a human problem not a forest problem. Humans live in these areas, and live off these forests. Not seldom the people whose homes are threatened by the fires are also landowners whose livelyhood is the forest itself. That the ecosystem grows back cyclically is no comfort, they expect their homes and livelyhood to be protected.

But are the severe droughts "normal and healthy"? California has over 100 million newly-dead trees in the last few years, which is unprecedented.

https://www.livescience.com/57124-california-drought-killed-...

Climate is never static. All weather is, "normal."

Unless we are about to put 300 ppm of carbon into the ground, Californian forests will either have to deal with the new normal, or die out.

Severe droughts are historic to California (and therefore "normal", though perhaps not "healthy"). https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/14/science/californias-histo...

Totally agree about Nature needs the odd wildfire. On the point of the bombing maybe the Vacuum bombs aka Thermobaric bombs could be a solution. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermobaric_weapon They burn more intensely so could the advancing edge be bombed so what is on fire burns out more quickly so that t can not advance? Although many will be familiar with the Fire triangle, if you can burnt an area at an accelerated rate, the fire can put itself out. As the vacuum bombs are essentially just fuel that suck/use the oxygen in the environment, they could steal the oxygen from the fire. These are also slow exploding bombs as a result but it would be interesting to see how they work on the advancing face of a wildfire. Hard part would be getting the right sized explosion, the Military cant control the size of an explosion that well, but Reaper drones could be used effectively with their laser targeting.

Since 1910, 95% of fires are caused by man: http://www.marinij.com/article/NO/20180812/NEWS/180819940

More unnatural issues: https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2017/10/12/164582...

Well, it’s both. Native Americans used to intentionally burn as a method of maintaining a healthy oak Savanah. Today, we don’t do that anymore and, like you said, we’re building in fire prone areas — but climate change is also creating longer fire seasons, and more droughts. It’s a deadly combination.

Agreed. Like the lodge pole pine that covers much of northwestern Wyoming and has serotinous cones that rely on heat to release their seeds.

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