Prescribed burn to clear way for pines
About 1,000 acres of mountaintop forest west of Bonners Ferry, Idaho, will be set ablaze Thursday in hopes of slowing the widespread collapse of a high-alpine tree species.
Because the whitebark pine trees grow only in the highest, rockiest reaches of the Inland Northwest, only hikers and serious backcountry adventurers tend to encounter them. Fat-laden seeds found in the evergreens’ cones have been a critical food source for grizzly bears and some birds.
After years of attacks by an exotic fungus and hungry bark beetles, more than 90 percent of the slow-growing trees have been wiped out, according to surveys conducted by the U.S. Forest Service. The agency hopes Thursday’s prescribed burns will create ideal growing conditions for a comeback.
Firefighters and a helicopter will be positioned throughout the areas to be burned, said Maridel Merritt, with the Forest Service office in Bonners Ferry. Extensive thinning took place in these areas last year in hopes of cutting back competing tree species and providing a source of dry, ready fuel for Thursday’s fires.
Although some regeneration is expected to occur naturally, the Forest Service has also been collecting cones from trees that appear to be resistant to the blister rust fungus. Hundreds of seedlings from these cones are now being grown at the agency’s nursery in Coeur d’Alene.
Similar efforts to restore whitebark pine are taking place across the region, especially in recent years as attacks by bark beetles appear to be on the increase, said Carl Fiedler, research professor of silviculture at the University of Montana. A small percentage of whitebark pine has been able to resist blister rust, he said, “but they’re not resistant to bark beetles.”
Decades of aggressive wildfire suppression has also hurt the trees, Fiedler said. Whitebark seedlings are not tolerant of shade, and without fires to clear away fast-growing competition from spruce and fir, the trees have little chance. The prescribed burns will provide some relief, he said.
“It’s a stopgap, but it should hold for a while,” Fiedler said.
Unlike other evergreens, which might start producing cones after 10 to 15 years, whitebark pine trees don’t start reproducing until 50 or more years of growth, according to the Forest Service. This makes it especially important to keep adding new trees to the high country so these highest elevation forests continue to grow, said Bryan Donner, an ecosystem planner for Montana’s Flathead National Forest.
The Selkirk Mountains northwest of Bonners Ferry hold the Inland Northwest’s largest remaining stand north of Idaho’s Clearwater River region. Other significant stands include Yellowstone National Park and the mountains of northwest Montana. Small patches in these areas are being burned and replanted each year, Donner said.
“It’s not a large amount of reforestation, but it would be irresponsible to do nothing,” Donner said. “Even though it’s only a small amount every year, this is a very long-term effort. In the course of 50 or 100 years, it will have an impact.”
Recent wildfires have helped the whitebark, according to Forest Service officials. A 5,000-acre fire this summer on Ulm Peak, along the Idaho-Montana border, helped clear competing species from ideal whitebark pine territory, said Randy Swick, ranger of the Coeur d’Alene River District.