Outdoors with Don Q: Be fire smart and create a fire-safe zone
Submitted by Carson Now Reader on Wed, 07/20/2011 - 1:34am
CARSON CITY — With our current long daylight hours, hot weather, gusty afternoon winds, low humidity and vegetation rapidly drying out, you need to be aware of the ever-increasing fire danger surrounding us.
Our countryside is tinder dry, and it would only take a moment of carelessness, sparks from target shooting, illegal fireworks, a hot vehicle muffler on a dirt road, an abandoned campfire or a tossed cigarette to create a roaring inferno.
Be fire smart!
We try to do so and here’s how:
The Quilici cabin is located on 1.5 acres on a steep hillside between Portola and Davis Lake, California. On that hillside, there are pine trees of all sizes, Quaking Aspen trees, Manzanita brush, sagebrush, assorted other trees and bushes, Mule Ear plants and lots of cheat grass.
Our biggest problem there is twofold:
— The never-ending accumulation of pine needles and pine cones.
— The ever-growing and ever-spreading cheat grass.
The needles, cones and cheat grass rapidly dry out in the scorching summer heat and become a serious fire danger.
To date, so far this year, Elaine and I have filled and brought out a total of 19 large, black, plastic bags full of winter debris, pine needles, pine cones, cheat grass and other weeds, plus tree and bush trimmings.
19 large bags and we are not done yet!
Geez, it almost seems as if you can watch the miserable cheat grass grow right in front of your eyes. That stuff is unbelievable. We have worked to clear a fire-safe zone around our cabin, which hopefully will reduce the danger to it if a fire should erupt.
However that fire-safe zone has come at a price.
We have spent a large number of days raking pine needles and cones, cutting or pulling up cheat grass, pruning and shaping branches on bushes and cutting off low branches on trees.
It would have been a lot more fun to drive several miles to Davis Lake to spend the day fishing for rainbow trout, but we care more about our property, so all our hard work, time and effort has resulted in a much better peace of mind.
However, there are some other neighbors in that immediate area who have not lifted a finger to reduce their fire danger, and it could get very interesting if something should happen on their properties.
Some of those neighbors’ cabins are surrounded by tall dry cheat grass and untrimmed pine trees with low branches and that particular combination is a disaster just waiting to happen.
In one particular case, those neighbors have visited their cabin just once in the last seven months. You would be amazed at how overgrown their property has become with cheat grass and other weeds. Keep your fingers crossed that nothing happens before the rainy season arrives this fall to dampen the countrywide.
As a matter of interest, when cheat grass dries out, it seems to take on the characteristics of gasoline when a flame encounters it. It almost instantly explodes into flames, and then you have a major fire problem on your hands.
So, if you have property where there is a combination of weeds (especially cheat grass), shaggy bushes and trees with low branches, take the time to be fire smart, work to reduce the fire danger and create a fire-safe zone.
That time and effort could make all the difference between a close call and a total disaster if a fire should occur.
Be fire smart!
Bet Your Favorite Pigeon
Bet your favorite pigeon that he can’t tell you about the areas where we pulled cheat grass last year.
If he sighs and says, “That stuff spreads like a wildfire and all of the areas, where Don and Elaine pulled cheat grass last year, were covered with cheat grass again this year,” he wins this bet.
Special note: Maybe we need to have a flock of sheep to eat that cheat grass, like the sheep used on Carson City’s “C Hill.”
— Writer Don Quilici is the Outdoors Editor for Carson Now. He can be reached at donquilici@hotmail.com.
